A Twist of Chance
by MockV
Summary: AU: Honestly, what were the odds of Uzumaki Naruto running into his only surviving relatives in the middle of the marketplace? Slim to none, right? Too bad the odds never mattered to the luckiest and most unfortunate genin in Konoha. [Not 367 Compliant]
1. Sincere Blue

"A Twist of Chance"

Warnings: This story is AU. It is NOT Ch. 367 compliant, as I began this before it was published and don't intend on changing anything now. It's also based after the last episode of the Wave Country arc, and relies on a suspension of disbelief regarding the amount of time that passes between that mission and the Chuunin exams. No romantic pairings as of yet. Some swearing, some violence, and much bad grammar is ahead. But, if you review, you get to criticize all of that! Please, enjoy.

* * *

Few things in Naruto Uzumaki's life were worth waiting for. "Instant" ramen usually took two or three minutes to stop being crunchy even _after_ water was put into it, the road to being the Hokage of Konohagakure was shaping up to be much harder and much longer than he'd first believed, and it was taking a damn long time for Sakura to get around seeing what a fantastic, strong, handsome guy he was. 

One thing that was _definitely_ worth waiting for, however, was the conclusion of a well-planned prank.

Naruto pressed his back against the plain, undecorated wall of Iruka's patio. One hand was gripping a coil of rope firmly while the other was twitching, forming seals out of reflex. The blond didn't pant, as it turned out that _nearly_ five years of ninja experience counted for a lot less than five years experience being Konoha's most notorious prankster. Keeping calm was something skimmed over in the academy (in as much as he'd actually been there for a few sessions, and it'd been covered for a lot longer), but it was something he'd gained sometime between the prank on his second grade teacher involving super glue and the prank on his taijutsu instructor in the academy (which involved vegetable oil).

The moment was golden. Iruka-sensei was stomping through his apartment, and Naruto tracked his progress through the volume of the curses - though, "curses" were debatable as Naruto regularly called his team mates worse - and the almost regular clang on Iruka's foot against the metal trash can, writing desk, foot stool, coffee table, and dry cereal land-mines.

Naruto decided on the spot that he'd need to involve plaster in more of his pranks.

Iruka's neighbors were pounding on their walls, and Iruka fell over once or twice trying to scurry over fast enough to apologize. The unwilling Kyuubi-vessel had to use all of his hard-earned composure not to laugh like a hyena, and instead bit his cheek as a focus. Naruto _loved_ Iruka. It wasn't in the same way that Kakashi loved his porn, or the way that Sasuke loved brooding, and it _definitely_ wasn't the same way that Naruto loved Sakura. Instead, there was the sort of love that Naruto imagined belonged to a family between them.

The blond still couldn't peg down exactly _what_ Iruka was to him. It was too distant to be a father-son relationship, and they were closer than Iruka just being his uncle. They weren't even brothers, as there were too many differences and secrets that hung between them for too long.

Naruto decided shortly after the Kyuubi revelation months ago that it didn't matter what he called Iruka, because Iruka was _there_, and really, he would've loved an _Uchiha_ if they'd shown him a scrap of kindness as a kid. It was just his luck that he managed to latch onto someone who was actually a nice person (arguably the single nicest person in all of Konoha, and without question the only Academy teacher who managed to retain both his sanity _and_ his cheerful disposition around Naruto).

But, the fact that Naruto loved Iruka didn't change the fact that he also loved to irritate the hell out him. This, Naruto decided, was what family was all about.

"NARUTO!" The shout came through the walls of Iruka's apartment, through the stone of the patio, and through the ear-plugs the kyuubi-vessel had prepared shortly after the stomping began. "That whipped cream had better be off my bed by the time I get out of the shower! I have parent conferences today - I don't have time to spare to remove this nail polish. And this...this..."

The blond snickered as he covered his ears with the flats of his palms.

"...never again, Naruto! Don't make me count to fifty after this is all over." Naruto had always wondered what exactly _would_ happen if his sensei ever got the whole way through his count. He hadn't tried it yet, and he was actually starting to realize that even _Iruka_ had no clue what would happen after forty nine.

The genin flexed his fingers once more, licking his lips as the steady thumping of Iruka's foot against the floor came closer. If Iruka saw the tripwires above the patio window, they would give him away and completely ruin the rest of the set up. Naruto waited with bated breath while Iruka placed one hand on the glass (and Naruto felt a surge of pride at the long, hot pink talons on his teacher's fingers), and exhaled heavily only after Iruka stomped back to the bathroom.

The door shut with a grumble and a click (due respectively to Iruka and a squeaky hinge), and Naruto heard the exhaust fan start up. The blond grinned, and quickly used the thin metal strip carefully hidden on his side to jerry-rig the lock open. He lifted the door over the slight bump that anyone other than Iruka's most frequent guest - him - would hit.

The rest of the set up was quick. A fan here. A bucket there. Three cans of soda, a handful of dulled trip wire, two heads of lettuce (which were very hard to get a hold of), and a few carefully placed textbooks completed a prank that Naruto ranked somewhere in his top thirty. It wasn't _nearly_ as complex as his graduation gift to the academy had been, and it wasn't nearly on the grand scale as when he'd painted the Hokage's Monument.

Naruto felt that, after the nail polish chipped off, the hair dye washed out, the permanent marker scribbles on the back of his neck were discovered and washed off, and after the rest of Iruka's leg hair grew back (as Naruto knew from experience that plaster peeled that and three layers of skin off), that his teacher would look back on this prank and laugh.

Iruka had a good sense of humor. As a cheerful chuunin, he saw the good in everyone, and as a teacher, he strove to make everyone seen good within themselves. Naruto had wheedled a few more stories about Iruka's childhood out of him, though it was a topic as delicate as china that frequently toppled their dinner conversation into awkwardness. Some of Iruka's pranks had gradually made it to the light, and Naruto couldn't help then a feeling of great pride that still resonated within him.

Because of his long discussions with his favorite chuunin, Naruto knew that reactions to large pranks, either good or bad, showed more accurately what kind of a person someone was more than any conversation, test, or battle could ever attempt. Small pranks were bad measuring sticks because their reactions were generally small and could be hidden or lied about rather easily in a village of ninja. But, large reactions to even larger tricks couldn't be completely disguised, and it reflected directly on a person how they behaved, or, in most cases, retaliated. Pranks were one of Naruto's most useful tools because it showed exactly what would drive a person to defend what they loved.

Some people went straight to violence at even the most harmless of pranks, but those same people usually would laugh whenever it wasn't their own house, property, or children involved. Some people tried their damnedest not to react at all, and Naruto had to devise a careful Nara-grade prank-playbook just to judge Shikamaru's character while they were partnered for a school project.

The resulting prank war seemed like a guerilla siege on all of Konoha. Though the basement of his apartment building still smelled like mint, and the rooftop of the academy was still covered with green house paint that even fifteen gallons of thinner wouldn't remove, Naruto finally found out that the Nara _did_ react to pranks. It was tough, dirty, exhausting work to finally find out what would call Shikamaru to defend his territory. As it turned out, tough, dirty, exhausting work was his answer all along.

The people who laughed about pranks on their own property were usually rather fun to hang out with. Sarutobi might've had an entirely different reaction to the first few pranks directed at him (though, those _did_ tend to destroy whatever paperwork he was working on the time), but over time he either grew or began showing an almost wry sense of humor. Iruka had won his "favorite person" award for a record number of times, though his consecutive run was broken when Old Man Ichiraku introduced the Mega-Bowl at his stand.

Naruto felt that he was the undisputed king of pranks in Konoha, as Iruka had hung up his crown sometime before he became a teacher, and though he did show promise, Konohamaru was still in the fledgling stage of practical jokes. He believed that there was no one in Konoha that would surprise him, and that there was nothing left anyone could tell him that would throw him for a loop. The Kyuubi _had_, but frankly, even Shikamaru would have gone into spasms if someone told him that there was a demon inside of him.

Aside from the occasional prank war, Naruto believed that there was no one who would dare to turn their ambitions onto Naruto to try to challenge him for his title.

This was, in its own way, true. It was no _person_ who pulled the greatest prank of history on Konoha.

Looking back on it what felt like centuries later, Naruto still didn't know _what_ pulled the prank. If it was a deity, it was one with a horrible sense of humor who probably enjoyed pulling the wings off flies and then setting fire to them. If it was all part of some master plan decided billions of years before, whoever decided it was drunk, sleep-deprived, and possibly completely out of their mind because the majority of Naruto's life made no sense even to Naruto himself, who was living it most of the time.

It was decided later on that it was something in between good luck and general chance that events arranged themselves like they did - that is, incredibly out of order and jammed together all at once.

When it was all over, and Naruto came out at the end of it mostly alive, mostly sane, and incredibly happy, he'd look back at it all and laugh because _his life_ was the greatest prank in the history of Konoha.

* * *

Naruto cursed as he dodged another civilian as he raced down the street. The rooftops might have been a better choice because as it turned out, civilians didn't have _homes_ to go to and just liked to stand still or walk slowly in the marketplace. Aside from that, _he_ would be on them now, and Naruto actually hoped that the huge, generally irritated crowd (as any crowd in a marketplace in temperatures _this_ high was bound to be irate) would grant him some cover. He only needed enough time to figure out a plan. He was _good_ at figuring out plans on the fly. 

He ran headfirst in the back of a woman with no warning. It rather figured, because even though Naruto would be ...not the _last_ to admit that he wasn't the greatest ninja, he liked to believe that he could've dodged her if the circumstances were any different. _If_ elbows weren't coming from eight different directions, he might have hit the _other_ old lady, and might have even preferred it because it was the old lady in the apartment across from him who always glared. As it stood, even though he hadn't been running at anywhere close to full speed because he had, of course, been around the villagers, the woman still plowed over as if it were Chouji who slammed into her, not a wiry twelve year old.

Naruto cursed aloud, rubbing his head because, even though he had no injury there, a few good smacks might knock some sense into it. Catlike, he flipped from the utterly revealing position of being completely laid out into a ready stance, glancing down only to realize that the woman wasn't getting up.

He glanced closer, carefully making his footsteps make noise as he approached her. She didn't respond, and Naruto found himself worried at about the same time a few forgotten ninja techniques from the academy choose to reveal themselves for the first time (as they were too lazy to show up when there were TESTS on them. Naruto was reminded of Shikamaru).

He moved to where he estimated the front of her was and found one hand partially extended on the ground. The subtle twitches of her wrist and of the veins on her neck proved that, at the very least, she wasn't dead. He crouched down beside her, using the back of his hand to feel hot breath from her lips.

He glanced around quickly as he heard murmurs from a crowd who'd quickly form around them. These people didn't just have no homes, they had no _lives_ either. He decided to try to speed things up a bit because Iruka was too damn smart _not_ too notice a large crowd bustling around a smaller orange blur was normally a sign that something was afoot. Bad things were just waiting for him if Iruka found him.

So, he decided, that wouldn't happen. He hopped up and reached for the woman's hand. She clasped his and squeezed about ten times more firmly than Naruto thought a civilian could as he pulled her upright.

He fell into shock.

Naruto was right on the mark - the woman _was_ alive. At first the tilt of her head and the sag of her head-wrap hid everything but the movement of her lips. Naruto decided that she was whispering a name so faintly that her very air disbursed the sound, until only the movement of it remained. She raised her head, and Naruto found out that he could freeze even _further_ because her eyes were a bright, vibrant shade of blue, like sapphires floating in the middle of the sea under a canopy of fluffy white clouds. Really, really blue.

Naruto faced those eyes every day in the mirror, and wondered if his were ever that shadowed.

Her face was gaunt. Her cheeks were slightly sunken, her eyes had dark circles that almost looked like black eyes, and he could've sworn he saw puffy rings around them as if she'd been crying very hard and very often. Even though the miracle of her eyes being both puffy and sunken at the same time, Naruto couldn't help but see the crows feet around her mouth and her eyes, and he couldn't tell if the things around her mouth were jours or smudges of dirt.

He put her initial estimate at about eighty, maybe more and maybe less. Naruto couldn't exactly be sure of age because so few shinobi survived long enough that their age was ever in question.

"Arashi." She murmured.

He didn't realize that she had even shifted until her hands were on either side of his face. He didn't realize that he had let his guard down so damn much until her forehead pressed against the top of her head, her arms wrapping themselves around his shoulders in an embrace ten times tighter than any rope could be.

It was then that Naruto realized she was a foreigner. Her clothes were of a rough material, like what they made sacks of in Konoha, and they were just saturated with the dirty smell of what he used to polish his kunai and shuriken. He caught whiffs of smoke, the odors of horses, and small imprints of someone else - someone female.

The fox had given him more than just whiskers. He'd just never told anyone about how strongly he could smell something like desperation clinging to the (crazy) woman's skin, or how sharply he could hear the scattered conversations from the crowd around him (he heard "fox", "crazy", "foreigner", and "shinobi" patched together most often.). He figured that one day, the fact that no one really knew what he knew might come in handy.

There were about a dozen ways a civilian could get in trouble for just being around him, and he didn't want to put this strange, possibly senile old woman in any danger. He tried to squirm out of her surprisingly tight grip, but she moved one hand to the center of his back.

He glanced up. She smiled at him.

Naruto felt at once as if there was a fishhook in the center of him that bound the two of them together, because at that moment, with her arms around him and her smile and the way she was warm, he never wanted to let go. Ever.

He'd heard about it before, but seriously hoped that he wasn't falling in love with the old woman because, despite the fact that she had been pretty once (it showed in the warmth of her smile and the shape of her eyes) she was _old_ now.

He didn't know whether to curse or cheer when a feminine voice called out behind them. "Mother! I think I've found something. This person, he says that he's..." she trailed off as she approached them, and Naruto got his first good look at her.

Even if the younger woman hadn't said anything about the old woman being her mother, Naruto probably could've made a damn good guess. She was roughly the same height as her mother, though she was smoother around the joints, and she had a small excess of hanging skin, as if she'd lost too much weight at once for her body to follow through with. Naruto got a better picture of what the older woman looked like when she was younger because despite the weight loss, the exhaustion, and the filth, she had a pleasant face with full lips and her mother's blue eyes. She had the same head-wrap as her mother and the same rough clothing - a tunic, pants, well worn, filthy shoes - and more than that, the same weary posture that, as she spotted Naruto, shifted into something like shock.

"Arashi". The name didn't leave her lips, but Naruto already knew what to expect. That same name repeated made him bite the inside of his lip and push away from the woman's loosening grip.

He scratched the back of his head while they watched him breathlessly, mindful always of the loose crowd around them. "Excuse me, lady," he said, trying to keep a level tone and not set them off just in case they _were _insane, "but I'm not this "Arashi" guy. The name's Uzumaki Naruto."

It wasn't just that the old woman's face fell. Instead, her entire body seemed to fall on top of itself like burning building. "'Naruto'?" the woman mouthed, looking at him with nothing less than confusion on her face. Suddenly, there was a light in her eyes as if she were standing in her own personal sunbeam. She licked her lips and _stared_ at him (which he was used to) with approval slowly dawning on her face (which he was _not_ used to). "Of course." She nodded to herself while her daughter looked on with confusion.

"I apologize, Uzumaki-san," the older woman began, glancing at her daughter and bowing. Her daughter got the cue and bowed in return, but Naruto waved her off, concerned about the fact that the _crowd_ might be as weirded out by someone bowing to him as he was.

The daughter spoke up again. "You look very much like someone that we're searching for. I suppose she just mistook you for him and let her feelings loose." She paused. "I probably would've done the same thing. You look so very much like him."

Naruto cracked his knuckles behind his head and began to fidget, flexing the balls of his feet as he suddenly remembered that even though he wanted to get lost in a crowd to avoid Iruka, being _found_ by Iruka while _in_ a crowd would lead to massive pain from everyone involved. "Geez. It's never happened to me before, but I guess it has to happen to everyone once in a while." He paused and sucked his cheek as he tried to figure out just why being around these two ladies made him want to choice his words carefully in about the same way that being in an old library made him keep away the explosive tags and kunai.

"If you live here," the daughter continued, her tone proving that _she_ was being cautious too, "do you happen to know where "Kazama Arashi" lives?"

He scrunched up his face in thought, and he knew she wasn't a ninja either because both she and her mother couldn't stop staring at him, and no ninja worth a grain of salt would be caught so many times in a row.

"Hm. Kazama. Kazama." He paused. "Sorry, but it ain't a family name that I know 'round here." Naruto glanced around. The crowd had started to thin, though "crazy" kept popping in his ears. He couldn't sense Iruka anywhere and felt a surge of pride at the thought that one of his bunshin he'd popped off miles ago had actually worked, and pulled the chuunin off the trail.

He turned back to the mother, whose blues eyes seemed to be watering. Later, he wouldn't possibly be able to say that he came to a decision, because that implied internal debate, and that was exactly what _didn't_ happen. As soon as he saw the first glisten of tears, he caved in.

"Ah, hell." He swore, kicking at the ground with one toe. "Tell you what. I'll take you 'round to one of the Hokage's offices, 'kay? They'll have a record of pretty much anyone you could be lookin' for." Of course, Naruto had _heard_ of these ninja information centers. He was almost sure he'd passed a few of them during various escape runs. He'd never actually gone inside of one, but he had the general gist of government from his time spent with Old Man Sarutobi and knew that _shinobi _had a hard enough time getting information out of them, and the idea of a civilian or, even less likely than that, a refugee milking information from them was just about as likely as Iruka letting up the chase and deciding that yes, pink really _was_ his color.

The good news about that was that it wasn't going to be these two women getting the information - it was more likely than not that Naruto would do that. If he couldn't get information out the honest way (by watching the facial tics of whoever it was that was there), he could always do it the shinobi way. The Forbidden scroll really hadn't been the first time he'd snuck into the Hokage's tower. It really only was the first time he'd been caught afterwards. If necessary, he knew he could go back to old habits, even if it was just for a day. If he could sneak out the Forbidden Scroll, he sure as hell could find out about this Kazama guy.

"Hey," he started, and he only took a tiny amount of pleasure in watching them jump, "what're your names?" He took a few steps forward and, looking back, bade them to follow him. The daughter paused, but the mother flowed freely through the crowd - they actually seemed to part around her - apologizing politely with a proud posture as she passed them. She seemed regal.

"Uzumaki-san," she started, but paused as Naruto admonished her with "Naruto, Naruto, please!". She smiled at him, and he felt that fishhook in his belly pull towards her again. "My name is Kazama Makoto, and this is my daughter Haruka." The woman, younger by far than her mother (being near the mid to early thirties, at first guess) bowed deeply. "We came here in search of my son, Arashi."

Naruto remembered that he was supposed to be the leader, and he found it hard not to just follow Makoto's long strides. Even though she had no idea of where she was going, she _seemed_ like she did, and Naruto decided that was yet _another_ secret Bloodline limit he desperately wanted. Forget all the freaky eyed people in Konoha, and the people who could pop into other people's heads or make their own portable showers - he wanted the ability to seem like he knew what he was doing when he really didn't.

"Our family," Makoto continued, "didn't know what became of Arashi. He disappeared far too many years ago, and now that Haruka and I have finally gained the," and she paused, alerting Naruto that something was amiss, "ability to travel, we sought to seek him out. However..."

"Let me guess - it's damn hard to find him here?" He waited for their nods. "You haven't been here long either, have you? Maybe a day or so?" He saw Haruka turn her head to her mother quickly, but Makoto made a small agreeing noise. He kept walking, watching the women following him through the corner of his eye and with his developed senses. They weren't a threat - Ninja developed a "danger-sense" early or didn't develop after that - and Naruto's senses told him that he was more likely to get impaled by a flagpole than be threatened by two exhausted, emotional civilians.

They rounded a corner again, and Naruto smirked, anticipating reactions from the ladies. He didn't get what he expected.

The faces of the Hokages on the memorial always seemed to be a bit screwed up for Naruto. He'd known Old Man Hokage all his life, as far back as he could remember it, and the old fart really looked nothing like the mountain. He didn't know when they carved it, but whoever did the first draft was apparently blind. Either that, or Sarutobi threw one of his sons in his place and told him to do his best. Ninja, as a rule, didn't take many photographs, if any. For security reasons, the Hokage monument was probably the only existing record of the the Shodaime or Nidaime. He didn't know if there were still pictures around of the Yondaime, but then again, he didn't know pretty much anything about the martyr who died sealing in the demon fox.

The two women, however, seemed to know a great deal about the Yondaime.

It was really a process of elimination. Old though she might be, Makoto couldn't have possibly lived around the Nidaime or the Shodaime. When they were around, Konohakagure was only just being born as a shinobi center. At the end of the Nidaime's reign and the beginning of the Old Man Hokage's, civilians were slowly integrated into the populace, forming a base that the city could fall back on in case of low shinobi population, attack, or war. If either Makoto or her daughter had known the Sandaime, they probably would've known about where he lived already, and they wouldn't be wandering around with no clue where they were.

The two woman were having visible reactions to the monument, and Naruto knew that it wasn't just about the size of it or the skill it took to carve it. The paths of their eyes were firmly cemented on the last face, a face that Naruto knew as well as his own because one day, he truly believed his face would be next to it.

"Who is that?" Haruka asked, her words faint enough that Naruto turned to face her. One of her arms sought her mother's in what Naruto decided was a search for comfort.

He raised an eyebrow. "Well, that's the Yondaime. One of the great leaders of the village. Much better than the old coot we have running it now, in my opinion." He scowled briefly, then shook his head. He kept one eye focused on them as he slowly kept walking. "He died a long time ago, though."

"D-died?" Haruka's hand looked like it was welded to her mouth, and she turned so pale that Naruto was shocked she didn't faint on the spot. Makoto glanced towards her daughter, and even Naruto couldn't miss the way Makoto glanced at the mountain, squinting and turning her head from side to side.

"Haruka," Makoto began, and her voice sounded exactly like Kakashi's in the middle of battle and exactly like Iruka's when Mizuki tried his whole "I'm evil!" theft phase. It was a voice that made everyone around stand up straight and listen. "We don't make assumptions. We didn't come here for rumors. We came here for facts, and for the truth." She turned her head towards Naruto, and despite himself, he couldn't help but lift his chin and straighten from his slouch. "You said that this office would have records of my Arashi-kun?" At his nod, she inhaled. "We'll see then."

Naruto coughed and drew Makoto's eyes towards him. "Oh." She glanced around, and she saw what Naruto knew ten minutes ago - there was no one around to listen in to them. "My son, Arashi? He looked so very much like your "Yondaime". Do you think there's a chance that he..."

Naruto sucked his cheek again. Aside from how incredibly unlikely it was, if this "Arashi" guy was really the Yondaime and their kin, it meant that he was dead. If he disagreed, and said that it was _unlikely_, it would probably kill whatever hope had just been born between them, and somehow, he just couldn't do that.

He shrugged. "Don't know. Never met the man. Even if the Yondaime were still alive, there aren't many ninja around here that actually see the Hokage - the town's leader, that is - on a regular enough basis to figure out what he was like, or about his past." Naruto carefully omitted the fact that he was around Sarutobi enough to know, by scent, the old man's favorite tobacco, whiskey, laundry detergent, and calligraphy ink.

"Oh," Haruka started, the widening of her eyes seeming to dissipate what tears still lingered there, "you're a ninja?"

Naruto nodded enthusiastically. It wasn't as if it was a village secret or anything. Not only would most people be able to tell it from his hitai-ite, but also by his sandals, his shuriken holders, and his uniform itself. He decided to let the fact that they _didn't_ know he was a ninja from fifty feet away slide under the fact that they really hadn't been in Konoha for more than a few hours. Aside from that, when he was Hokage, everyone would know who he was, so it didn't really matter who he told he was a ninja now. "I'm the greatest ninja in this village, you know? Everyone here knows the name "Uzumaki Naruto"!" This, he soothed himself mentally, was _technically_ true. Of course, he could count on his hands the number of people who knew his name in a _good_ way, but he didn't add this on.

"Well," he broke, "Information, here we come!". He turned them down a back alley he often used as a short cut between the major shinobi transportation system (also known as "the rooftops") and the market. Ushering them in front for a moment, he quickly formed the seals for the Kage Bunshin technique while they weren't looking, sending more clones on different paths through the city. He went so far as to change a few into copies of Haruka and Makoto, in case Iruka-sensei had been very, very observant. "And after that..." he started, catching up to them, leaping over them, and settling down into a brisk walk that was little more than a ninja crawl, "We can go eat food. More importantly, we can eat ramen!" He grinned, fangs over his lips. "And you can tell me all 'bout yourselves, 'kay? If you really did know the Yondaime, you probably know a whole bunch of secrets about why he was so cool, and stuff."

Makoto laughed. "It would be our pleasure, to dine with you, Uzum-" Naruto cleared his throat meaningfully, and she paused slightly. "I mean, Naruto-san. But, I must ask this. What is this "Ramen"?"

And thus, a connection was formed, however tenuous and slight it appeared at first. But, even the mightiest trees of Konoha were once seedlings, just as the greatest Hokage were mere snot-nosed brats with ambitions, and the greatest stories often began with the most ignoble incidents such as this day, when Uzumaki Naruto met his only surviving relatives by stumbling into them.

The odds were astronomical - a million to one didn't scratch the surface. But, thousands of legends continuing on even after his death stated one fact that echoed through his life and actions: Uzumaki Naruto was the number one Ninja when it came to screwing the odds.

* * *

First fic. Don't laugh. 

This chapter revised on 8.30.07, originally published on 6.17.07.


	2. Paper Trails

Chapter 2

Naruto Uzumaki found himself standing in front of what many Shinobi considered to be hell on earth. The front of the building looked unassuming and plain, much like the other small government offices scattered through the village almost haphazardly. It was said that the Shodaime himself chose the positions for many of the most important strategic buildings in the village, carefully spacing them and disguising them in areas that, at the time, were industrial or military-based.

Naruto came to the conclusion that the Shodaime had been either very drunk while 'carefully planning' the random spacing of the buildings, or he'd used a dartboard, a map, and a liberal amount of alcohol, which circled back to the first option anyway.

The two refugee women, Makoto and Haruka, had held up well during the relatively long journey. Naruto was actually thankful that he had gotten up early this morning to prank, otherwise, he know that he would've missed the few, random hours that the office was open today. Glancing at the sign - "Konoha Branch: Bureau for Information, Research, and Community Health" - and the hours listed on a small piece of paper stuck to the very edge of the window in tiny print - "Tuesday and Thursday open to public, 11:30 until 3" - he noted the small shinobi symbols written in a fine layer of dust and grime on the window. They translated roughly to "Pain!" and "Help me! (non combat)", with a small symbol he couldn't read that looked vaguely like a one-eyed dog with a slash mark through it.

"Well, I think this is the place." He turned to the two women, who smiled and sagged visibly in relief. "Tell you what," he started, glancing at the way Makoto was favoring one leg and the sweat pouring glistening on Haruka's brow, "I'll go in and see what I can do about getting information on your Kazama Arashi, alright?" He stretched out his neck, try to leverage an extra inch to see through the moderately busy traffic. This street - "Sarutobi Lane", named after not the Sandaime but a successful merchant of leather goods who had a shop down the way - had a surplus of merchants set in small stone alcoves along the pass. Despite the shade, the street still seemed blisteringly hot. The temperature today had to be insufferable for civilians, but Naruto had long ago developed resistance to that sort of thing. He really needed to when his best clothes were a sweatpants and jacket set, loaded with hidden weapons and goods and padded with inches of worked leather.

"I'll probably be in there for a while, you know." He stated, more to himself than anything, "So, could you ladies get me something to drink while I'm in there? I hate to ask it and all, but..." he twisted his head, watching their silent exchange when their eyes met. He tried to decipher it, and settled on the explanation that, by the state of their clothes, they weren't well off. To be fair, he wasn't that rich either, but somehow, his "moderately wealthy" and their destitution didn't even compare. "Just until lunch, I mean. Then again, I'm a growing boy! We could just get something to eat now, and the office migh-" he fumbled his words, "er, should be open then." He tried to smile at them, his normal "foxy" grin awkward on his face suddenly.

"We'll be fine, Naruto-kun", Makoto stated sternly, sitting slowly on a nearby bench. Haruka took off her pack and sat beside her mother, sparing a shake of the head in Naruto's direction. "I'm not so old yet that a bit of walking will ruin me, or that a bit of waiting will fray my nerves." Naruto saw that her hands in front of her were nearly trembling, and Naruto didn't know if or how much she was lying about her health. "The fact that you're willing to go there in my stead, willing to hasten any information we could get ... that is more precious to me than water or rest."

Naruto spun quickly on his heel to face the building, the strange feeling in his chest twisting his heart and his stomach until he felt that they were draining all the air from him. Her smile made him feel like he couldn't breathe, and he didn't know why that felt so good all of the sudden.

"Well," he said, hoping that no one else heard the crack in his voice that he completely blamed on puberty stopping in for a visit, "we still have that dinner date, y'know!"

Haruka actually giggled, and sounded like she was ten. "A date with such a handsome young man? Naruto-kun, you'll spoil us!"

Naruto hoped desperately that they didn't see the way his skin betrayed him, turning a bright red somehow didn't match bright yellow and orange, and quickly ducked his head and darted into the building like Nukenin were on his tail. He thought he heard laughter and wasn't sure if he should be worried or overjoyed that for once, it might've been coming from the voice in his head.

* * *

"BIRCH" was called "The Bureau of Bureaucracy" in muted whispers by jonin around their campfires and drinks. Naruto appreciated this name to the fullest at the moment he entered the building. The public part of the office was rather tiny, no bigger than a public restroom. There were a total of two chairs to sit in, both occupied by two elderly men who might've been shinobi, might've been civilian, and might've been around since before both terms were coined. It was as if that section of the room was carved around them, because the overwhelming towers of unfinished, unorganized paperwork that cluttered the other section were noticeably empty. As he entered, the two men gave him a weighty glare. For an instant, he felt their eyes sink straight through his stomach until they glared directly at the fox-bastard sealed there, and than that instant was gone, replaced instead by a feeling of utter confusion as the two old men turned to each other with identical snarls on their lips. 

"Look at those clothes!". The two men looked identical to each other save for a few more tufts on the head of the one on the right, and a few more tufts in the ears on the one on the left. They wore traditional robes and sandals, and Naruto wondered if they realized what era they were in. He was answered moments later when their banter continued.

"Simply despicable!" one old man coughed, slamming his cane against the floor.

"I agree!" the other crowed, also slamming his cane into the floor.

"The nerve!" The one on the left creaked, squinting at Naruto again. "Can't believe youngsters wear orange now! And on a Saturday, no less!" Naruto had to force himself not to face vault. He wondered what that had to do with anything, but quickly came to the conclusion that the whole scenario playing out before him made no sense. It seemed so surreal somehow that he resisted dispelling the genjutsu.

"You old coot!", the one on the right barked, whipping the cane around to the slightly balder old man with a startling shinobi-like speed. "It's Monday! Any fool can tell that!"

"'Old Coot"?" Naruto swore he saw a cloud of dust when the living, breathing fossil hunched forwards in his chair, his shoulders shaking until the trembling passed to his whole body. Naruto thought fleetingly about where the nearest hospitals were when the frail man let out a high pitched whine. "How DARE you talk to your father like that! Your mother would roll in her grave!"

The other old man shook his identical cane at his father, before surrendering the effort and resorting to thumping it on the floor for effect and as punctuation. "Mother's not dead yet, you senile geezer!"

"Lazy upstart! Your grandchildren would be ashamed of you!" With this, Naruto backed very cautiously away until their voices faded slightly. In his deliberate effort not to draw attention back to himself, he completely missed all the warning signs he'd been trained for years to gain, and ran back first into another person for the second time that day.

His ninja senses had never been this humiliated, even when he'd been caught so completely flatfooted by Haku. If Kakashi-sensei were here, he'd never let Naruto live this down.

Then again, the genin rationalized, the odds of the masked man being in a government establishment of any sort, let alone one that took conscious effort to find and enter, were very low. Factored in was the complete and utter lack of anything either discernibly female or visibly engaged in a desperate battle for survival, and it seemed like Naruto would need to be the single most unlucky bastard in the history of Konoha if he weren't able to gracefully back away from whoever he had rammed into, complete his original mission, and then stealthily retreat and deny that this whole thing had ever happened.

"Why, it's certainly a surprise to see you here, Naruto-kun!".

'I hate my life'. He was too frozen to do anything but stiffen even further as the familiar figure untangled himself with all the grace and dignity that fled from Naruto the moment he woke up today.

The blond could _hear_ the smug smile on Kakashi's face. He wasn't a Hyuuga, but that didn't stop him from knowing that his sensei's visible eye had crinkled into that haunting, damnable crescent, even before he turned around. "Surely, it's a sign from the heavens that this meeting was meant to be! Here," he continued, his tone completely shifting from sugary sweet to ice cold in an instant, "take this stack of papers to the front desk." The Jonin placed an ungodly thick pile on one of his frozen hands, and Naruto had to snap out of his shock to balance himself out, nearly toppling over as he strained to get the wobbling tower into control.

Naruto stared blankly up at the Jonin, who then had the grace to look sheepish. The silver-haired man rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, as it turns out, the other instructors enjoy doing paperwork just as much as I do..."

Naruto picked up the weighted pause at the end of that statement. "Which," Naruto took up, "means that you all are too lazy to fill out your mission reports and stuff." He glared at the ridiculously tall man. "So, which one of you lost the bet to the Old Man?" Naruto navigated his way over to what could've been the front desk, getting his pride back with every moment that his teacher wasn't cackling at his misfortune.

"Gai." The kyuubi-vessel thought for a moment, remembered Gai from a few chance meetings around Konoha and found himself nodding at Kakashi's answer. He paused, a question striking him, and he raised an eyebrow at his sensei.

"Wait, if Gai lost, then how did you get stuck with" and he gestured widely, "all of this crap?" He pulled out a report with his teeth, skillfully setting the stack down. He glanced at it, wincing at the awful handwriting that made his look manageable by comparison. "Wait, this is from Team Eight!" He flipped a few pages, glancing through blocked words. "And this is from Team Ten..." he glanced up warily at Kakashi. "This is from Team Nine. Wait, I didn't even know we HAD a Team Five, but that's in there too."

The Jonin sniffed and glanced away. "Sure, I had to collect and organize all of that, but frankly, I got off lucky."

The silence in the air grew thick with dust, the muffled-sounding curses from the old men, and the rustling of paperwork. Naruto finally spoke, his words strategically chosen.

"Lucky compared to...?" Kakashi grinned, opened his mouth, and Naruto instantly felt a sense of complete and utter dread wash over him in icy waves. "Waitwaitwait! I don't want to know. REALLY don't want to know."

"Aw!" Kakashi cooed, ruffling the blonde's hair with disregard as he pulled a certain book from his vest pocket with the other arm. "You DO have some survival instincts after all!" One eye poked out from over the orange cover. "You didn't seem to have any instincts left when it came to avoiding civilians, so a teacher has to wonder about their student."

"HEY!" Naruto shouted, "You're a Jonin! It's your job to sneak around and all. It's not my fault that you're such a lousy instructor that you can't teach about detection and stuff worth a damn."

"You wound me." Kakashi deadpanned. He motioned with one hand, and Naruto turned around to see a very serious looking man behind the front counter, looking at him with an expression that stated the fact that he was not amused by Naruto's antics.

Naruto gulped.

"Er, hey. Yeah, you." He said, fidgeting in place while he tried to smile. "Listen, I'm here because I need to get some information and-"

"And I need to submit paperwork for genin teams designations GM-11, HK-7, KY-8, SF-5, and SA-10." Kakashi continued, his voice rising a few octaves and sounding sickly sweet - a cruel commentary on Naruto's voice. "Or at least," he concluded in a whisper that only Naruto could hear, "you will if you don't want your teammates to" and he practically giggled, "_assist_ you in retraining those "not running into people" reflexes." Naruto growled, and Kakashi continued smoothly from behind his book, and still crouched behind Naruto. The genin marveled at how much effort Kakashi continually put into making other people do his work for him. For a six foot man to hide behind a four-foot something genin probably took more skill in concealment and silence than most ninja used in an entire day. It went without mentioning that if Hatake Kakashi had put even half that energy into doing his paperwork, he'd have done it six months ago and saved himself the hassle.

The silver-haired man continued on, much to Naruto's dismay. "As your loyal teammates, I'm positive that they'll want to help you get better as a shinobi. Even if it does take all-night training sessions. Isn't there supposed to be a thunderstorm tonight? Oh well, no matter. I'm sure they'll make any sacrifice necessary for the good of th-".

"Alright!" he muttered, writing the symbols for "jerk" with his fingers against his thigh.

Kakashi poked him in the back. He traced the symbols for "I heard that". Naruto hung his head.

"Yes, I'm here to do _allllll_ of this paperwork, and then I wanna get some information about a guy who could've lived here a while ago." The clerk gave him an incredulous stare. "What?"

"'A guy who could have lived in Konoha a while ago'?" the clerk wondered aloud. He shook his head. "Do you have any idea how vague that is for an office like this? You're insane." He adjusted the bulky pair of black glasses in an almost dismissive motion. "Also, unless you have permission from your jonin instructor stating that this is related to shinobi training, genin cannot fill out official paper-" He was interrupted when a hastily signed note skidded across the desk in front of him, wrapped around a blunted shuriken. Naruto turned to find that Kakashi had already bolted. It was likely that he'd been halfway through the front door when Naruto agreed to do the paperwork. Naruto's eyebrow twitched, and half his thoughts circled around the question of what he could do to his sensei to get him back for this.

There was a moment when the only thing that could be heard was the clerk's unfurling of the crinkled paper, and then he cleared his throat. The clerk looked young, about early twenties. He seemed like the sort who put full dedication into his job, and left zero room in his life for anything that actually resembled a life, like family, romance, or fun. He had his dark hair combed back neatly, slicked back with the reflective oil shinobi learned very early not to get near. His outfit was the official uniform for the lower level of the shinobi administration, but the loose black robes with thin red embroidery seemed to clash with the small green pin on his lapel. There wasn't, of course, a name tag or any truly identifying marks - the lapel was a concession to how dangerous this job _wasn't, _otherwise government workers dressed more like civilians than the civilians themselves. All in all, he did _not_ seem like the sort to tremble. The man's voice squeaked once, and he paused, breathing in and out steadily. "Y-your instructor is H-hatake K-k-kakashi?", he asked as his glasses fogged up.

Naruto nodded, and his feet guiding him back a few steps. The man actually _whimpered_, and Naruto watched in incredulous awe as the man's eyes rolled back in his head and he fell backwards out of sight with a soft thump. Naruto quickly leaped onto the counter and then behind it, searching the clerk for a pulse. He was alive, but out cold, the paper still clutched in his hands.

"...Okay, whatever." Naruto said with a shrug. He looked around, and couldn't see the two old fossils behind all the paperwork and potted fake plants. "If it works, go with it." He murmured to himself as he softly jumped over the body. "Well, I wanna get out of here quick so I can eat dinner with Makoto-san and Haruka-san, and Sakura-chan and Sasuke-bastard will just _kill_ me if they have to go through with another midnight session." He scratched his head. "Hey! I know." He grinned, and fell into the ready stance, hands frozen mid-seal. He sent a mild pulse of Chakra through the still hands, concentrating on the separate threads that seemed to flow from them. There weren't nearly as many as he started with, with just five of his original bunshin from this morning still remaining. All the Makoto and Haruka clones had dispelled long ago, and he 'remembered' being hit by Iruka in three different clones.

Naruto wished he could convince the Hokage to let him have another look at the "Forbidden Scroll". He'd been told early on that the Kage Bunshin technique was listed on there not because it was incredibly difficult, but because of the incredible amount of Chakra needed not just to initiate it, but to maintain it. Doing anything fancy with it required precise mastery of it, as well as superb Chakra control. Naruto had the "mastery" part of it down pat, but found that "magnificent Chakra control" didn't matter much when you had an endless power supply. It seemed like the Kage Bunshin had always been a part of his life, but in fact he'd only had it for a matter of months. Most shinobi wouldn't dare experimenting with their techniques without proper instruction and _years_ of training with it. Naruto had neither time nor instructors - no one in the village could even try to copy the sheer number of his clones. Naruto was the only one who could understand what it was like to be part of a hundred minds at once, and still be the same person through it all. He couldn't put into words how deceptively hard (and yet, relatively easy) it was to coordinate the moves of dozens of clones so they didn't all end up in a pile.

Naruto had managed it an hour after he learned it.

But, there was another reason that the technique was listed as forbidden. He called it "Info Overflow", but it probably had a technical name like "Sensory Saturation" or something. What happened was that, as soon as a clone was dispelled - whether by an enemy, by lack of energy, or by simply severing his connection with it - all the information it took in during it's "life" was instantly transmitted to the original Naruto.

When Naruto sent his clones ahead as scouts, or as distractions, he had to cope with a brief moment of complete and utter disorientation as completely conflicting memories fought inside of his head. Conversations 'he' hadn't had, skirmishes he never played in, and places he hadn't been suddenly became his own conversations and his own battles. The disorientation mainly came from being in twelve different places at once. When one connection was severed, it was like it rippled through the rest of them, forcing them all to "report in" through their own connections. The feedback sucked, and Naruto was damn sure that if it weren't for the Kyuubi and the healing abilities they shared, his head would've exploded by now.

Literally.

The fact that it was a dangerous technique didn't stop him from using every advantage he could, though, and he activated his connections to his clones again, dispelling them all in a shot and recoiling from the overload for a brief minute. After a pause, Naruto exhaled heavily, straightening up and shaking off imaginary battle wounds.

Iruka had been led to the far opposite end of Konoha through the forests. To make his luck even better, the clone had been in the trees when it'd been dispelled, meaning that Iruka had no clue where he was now. His old sensei hadn't encountered any Makoto or Haruka clones, which meant that they were safe where they were.

Naruto checked his watch. He'd been in here for about a half hour, and wanted to speed things up. He grinned, fox fangs peeking over his lip. He could do fast.

He stepped through the curtain-shaded doorway that led into the back of the office, momentarily losing his focus. Rows and rows of shelves were crammed in haphazardly, some stacked to the ceiling without an inch to spare while others were only waist height and nearly abandoned. Books, boxes, oddly shaped statues and scrolls filled some shelves entirely, while twine-tied parcels were the only objects on others. Loose leaf papers were strewn everywhere with the same glee of a preschooler with a can of silly string.

"Well, damn," he whistled, eyebrows inching high on his forehead, "this isn't gonna be easy." He crouched down, balancing on the balls of his feet while he forced a single kage bunshin, who was formed in complete mimicry of his position. His clones weren't able to use any techniques themselves, but a handy secret he'd found on the fly was that somehow, they helped his chakra control when he really needed to focus.

Using the first clone as a "template", he willed a little over a dozen into existence. All of him straightened and massed together in a jumbled group. "Alright!" he - the original - called while he - the clone and the mass entity - listened. It was confusing as hell, and Naruto had thought about assigning names or personalities to some of them, just to make it easier in his head. "Listen up! We want to make this quick so we can get out of here for some ramen-" he was interupted by an enthusiastic chorus of "Ramen!" and "Let's eat!" and one or two polite inquiries of "Hey, can I have some too?".

"Mmm, Ramen." His stomach rumbled, and he licked his lips. "Anyway, let's search for any information about "Kazama Arashi" or the Yondaime in here." As one, they all glanced at the room, then back to him. "...Yeah, I know. But, do it for Makoto!" There was a round of cheers. "And Haruka!" There were more cheers. "And RAMEN!" That gained an almost deafening round of hoots, applause, and cheers, and Naruto was very glad that the clerk was out cold and that the old men were already deaf. "Let's go!"

There were three large aisles, and all of the Narutos quickly found that all of the paperwork was in no particular order at all. Some boxes of paperwork had a collection dating back fifteen years and over thirty different failed genin and chuunin teams. That brought back the original paperwork, and he created two more clones to double-check the paperwork and, since the clerk was out cold, stamp it with the official seal laying nearby.

Naruto winced when he realized that being in the back room of a government office was probably treason of some sort. Then again, he rationalized, there still was that note Kakashi wrote, and when he'd glanced at it, it said that he had permission to do paperwork for the genin teams. It didn't, of course, specify what _era_ the genin teams had to be in. With that in mind, he made of few of himself start organizing the disarray, grouping together senseis, teams, and students. It had to be the first time in the history of Bureaucracy that having papers in triplicate actually came in handy.

As some of the bunshin read paperwork, others ran courier around the room and passed boxes and figures to still others who climbed on the shelves in makeshift, human ladders. The first Naruto started feeling a throbbing in temple that was usually disguised by successive bouts of adrenaline in battle, but was now out undisguised. He felt into the pouches on his leg and pulled out a small packet of aspirin, swallowing five dry. It wouldn't help very much or for very long, but unless the Kyuubi worked on numbing the pain and not destroying the pain relievers, it would have to do.

The room was awash with noise. There were papers rustling, boxes being folded together, taped, taken apart, or scraped against metal shelving as some Narutos muttered curses under their breath. One Naruto he'd almost put a name to hummed a cheerful song as he balanced precariously on the shoulders of another one, who was glaring spitefully at the world. He patrolled the aisles, reinforcing chakra here and there, dispelling any particularly uncooperative clones and replacing them with fresh clones who had 'seen' the example he set. Naruto found that it really helped when making clones that they knew exactly what he knew when they were born, and could seamlessly fit into battle, or whatever task he needed them to do, again.

"Found something!" one clone shouted, waving a fistful of papers. Naruto hurried to that one, watching as the clones on either side of him slowed down and peered over his shoulder. He squinted at the paperwork, trying to make out handwriting that had to be worse than his.

"I think..." he said, bringing the paperwork back and away from his eyes a few times, "that this definitely proves he was here." The forms were yellowed already with age. The date at the top was very nearly twenty years old, and the name "Kazama Arashi" was printed in box letters near the top, with the writing getting progressively worse from there. "Team Arashi", he strained, "Genins Suzuko Rin, Uch-" He swore to himself. He couldn't make out anymore than that. He might've see a "ake" in there, but that could've been a "wre" just as easily with handwriting like that. He pondered for a moment. The "Uch" probably was a Uchiha of some sort - he knew that twenty years ago, they'd been all over the place.

The clones around him paused expectantly. "Right! Good work!" He rewarded the clone who'd found it with a fresh burst of Chakra that guaranteed life for a bit longer (or until a really good hit). "But, back to work!".

The clones mumbled, but their pace sped up a small bit from what it was before. They had a lead, and even if it was just a tiny start, Naruto could and always had taken whatever he could get.

* * *

Thanks for all the review so far! My thanks to Norry for reading this over a few times and resisting the urge to burn it at first sight. Criticism is welcome! 


	3. One Ring to Rule Them All

I don't own Naruto. No one else posting on FF.N does either.

Chapter 3

Naruto's head pounded as he struggled to make out even a few more words of the paperwork he held in front of him. "Right," he spoke to himself, "this is definitely about _a_ Kazama Arashi. But, is it Makoto and Haruka's, or someone else's?" He sucked his cheek for a moment, and concentrated on the first Naruto clone, who'd been wandering the aisles as foreman.

"Yeah, boss?" The first clone jumped into view. "What's up?" He scratched his ear lazily, with a half grin that his more independent ones always seemed to take.

"What's going on? How's Kakashi-sensei's paperwork coming? Did any of us find anything else yet?" Both Narutos looked around the room, where just over two dozen clones now were working in a discordant tandem no one else would ever fit into. Naruto had to create a few more when, after actually reading some of the paperwork he was trying to organize, he realized he needed two clones on "Dictionary Duty" just to figure out where to sort it all. After that came another clone who was perched on an oversized "Rules and Regulations, BIRCH branch, Konoha v.2.0.4 (d)" tome that took five Narutos to lift off the floor, where it'd been serving as a table for six boxes of what seemed like tax receipts to every civilian whose name contained an "a". It served as a code breaker. Otherwise, they'd never be able to figure out the difference between form 875-d(b), which showed the annual profit that a shinobi made from working in a civilian business, and form 876-b(d), which showed how much civilians could get reimbursed for collateral damage in major shinobi battles.

The foreman seemed to bite his lip. "Well, we're workin' through the paperwork cluttered at the front desk. Kurenai's handwriting sucks, by the way, and all the other teams get more cash than us. Back here," the clone continued with a jerk of the head towards the clones, "we're still organizing this crap. God knows how - or even if - they ever get any actual work done around here." The foreman scowled in irritation. "Anyway, we're sorting out the papers, but most of them are junk papers like grocery receipts or thirty year old take-out menus, civilian reports compainin' about noisy shinobi fights or broken roof tiles, or completely classified papers from the Hokage's office, but there was only one shelf of 'em and they're censored as hell."

"...wait, 'noisy shinobi fights'? Isn't that a complete oxymoron?" The foreman looked at him expectantly.

"You tell me, boss. How noisy are your fights?" The clone smirked at him, and Naruto resisted the urge to poof him out of existance and create a new one that wasn't as cocky.

"Point taken."

Naruto looked down at the papers he'd been concentrating on making out. It was a standard form that he was currently processing at the front desk, used for every genin team when they did anything below a C-rank mission. It had blanks for the task, the difficulty of it and why (or why not), and room for commentary by the instructor about the job, the client, and observations about his students. This particular form was used for civic duty D-missions, which were usually things like cleaning up all the trash in Konoha's parks or manually stocking fish in the rivers.

While the names of the students were still indicsernable, he could make out a few comments about the job, written in Arashi's hasty script. "Too damn easy for us" and "why the hell are you giving me this crap" were underlined, and "bet you never made Tsunade clean out dumpsters" was scrolled along the side of the paper, creeping across the corner and connected with an arrow. His head ached, but he swore he head that name somewhere before.

As he twisted the paper, trying to tell if those sentences really read "put the brat in the dumpster" and "-ito's hair got caught in the garbage disposal", he saw a small indentation at the top of the paper slightly shadowed in the light. He ran his fingers over it, feeling the bumps and ridges that normally came with a seal. A thought came to his mind, an then an unfamiliar flash of guilt. He turned around on his heel, marching towards the shelves.

"You!" he barked towards a clone with slumped shoulders and a guilty expression. "Yeah, I felt that. Put that book back!"

"But, boss!" the clone pleaded, looking forward with puppy-dog eyes that usually did the trick with Iruka, "This box is full of 'em, and this sign says that they're free!"

Naruto walked over and took the book with one hand, noting how the clone cringed. He really hoped that the clones didn't represent parts of his personality, because this one really got on his nerves. He glanced at the cover - "Royal Proclamations of the Fire Lord." Below that in smaller print was "_Collected Rules and Laws of the Fire Kingdom_" and near the bottom, in green ink that was supposed to blend in with the cloth cover was "Konohagakure for Dummies." Naruto raised an eyebrow at his clone.

The clone shrugged. "Hey, it's free. It doesn't matter what it's about." He flipped the box's lid over so the original could read it. In large block letters, written with dark black ink cracking from the age, the lid read "_Please_ take one." Naruto picked a small post it note off the side of the box, where it'd been wedged halfway between the handle and the lid. The writing was incredibly sloppy, and very familiar. He held the mission report statement up to the post it note. The style - if holding a pen in your mouth and shaking the table could be called a style - was exactly the same.

He held the note high up to the light to make out the faint pencil markings. "According to ...vlc-167 of the Hokage/Daimyo accord ...dated twenty ...penguin monkey cabaret..." He paused. "What the hell?"

A studious clone to the right, who'd been nose deep in the largest scroll he'd ever seen, came over, plucked the note from Naruto's hand, and held his fingers to his nose as if he was adjusting his glasses. Naruto almost had a name for this clone too, but it wasn't a very polite one. "According to section Qu, paragraph vlc-167 of the Hokage/Daimyo accord of the First, all those who are born and raised with the blood," he started, flipping over the note and turning it sideways, "of Fire in their veins will be considered to be bound by the laws of the Fire Lord, so long as such knowledge is granted upon them." The clone handed the note back briskly. "It's an excerpt. From that book, I presume. It means," he said in a haughty tone that Naruto growled at, "that the Hokage agreed that the citizens of Konohagakure are still citizens of the Fire Kingdom." The mild mannered clone and the Original Naruto stood pondering for a moment.

"So," the other clone started, "this means that...uh...something about the Fire Lord bossing us around?" He rubbed the back of his head.

"I doubt he could ever boss _us_ around, but there are benefits we could reap. The Shinobi of the Leaf might be soldiers in the village, and mercenaries for the Fire Lord at his commission and beckon, but still citizens under his rule." He pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose again, as if seeking some external patience. "Only so long as shinobi know about it." He glanced around. "This could be a strong advantage. I would advise us to read this," The snobbish Naruto intoned. He glanced pointedly at the book still in Naruto's hand, and then gave the note back to the meek clone. He walked back to the scroll, opened it up, and continued to scan lines with his fingers, lips tracing out words under his breath.

"What a jerk." The "meek" Naruto looked to the original. "Can I poof him?" He looked up, hopefully. "Please?"

The original shuddered. "Geez. I really don't want to, if it means that I'll get back some of that freakin' attitude. Reminds me of Sasuke in a bad mood."

A Naruto on an errand ran by, and raised an eyebrow as he passed. "In a "bad" mood? Geez, when isn't he pissy?"

All Narutos present snorted. The original looked at the cloth bound book for a second, then shoved it in a pocket of his jacket. "Fine, I'll take it. Can't guarantee I'll understand it, but well, I could always prop up the kitchen table with it."

He stuck the post it note against the mission report again. "Same handwriting. Kazama Arashi knew about these civilian handbooks. He knew about the Hokage/Daimyo accords." He glanced about, finding a Naruto trying to slack off, and made him get a pencil. "Let's see." The kyuubi-vessel murmered, flipping the mission report over and scribbling against the back of where the seal was. He made out the backwards words carefully. "Office of Sanitation". He stopped. "What the hell?! That doesn't help at all! Dammit, this was just a copy for that office's receipts. There's pretty much not anything on him as a shin..." He smacked his forehead. "Damnit. This is a joint shinobi/civilian office. Of _course_ there's gonna be nothing but stupid stuff about Shinobi. Arashi was obviously a ninja - of course there's jack here about him."

With a growl, he handed the paper to the nearest Naruto, who passed it down the line until it was stuck in a folder. By now, most of the paperwork had been sorted into named boxes, the books lined neatly by author on shelves, while the statues and artifacts had been looked at and sorted, by names when there were any, and by type when there weren't. Most of the statues were made of wood, but a few were heavy, like they were made of metal, but were almost warm to the touch. A few more were actually hollow inside. Whoever had examined the figurse before hadn't had much of a shinobi's training, because the secret compartments were almost glaringly obvious. Of course, he did have experience with secreting items away. The orphanage had been good for something other than teaching him to run quick and not get caught.

He glanced at the paper once again, already getting sick of it but remembering the incredibly sloppy writing. If Makoto and Haruka were right about their instincts, he knew who he'd been searching for from the start. He tapped the shoulder of one Bunshin. "Hey, any word on the Yondaime?"

"Just the censored documents," the bunshin said. "Hey, boss. We're running low on energy. You might wanna..." the clone rolled his hand meaningfully.

"Yeah, yeah," Naruto mumbled under his breath as he bumped past. "Speed it up, I know, I know." His stomach grumbled agian. "Trust me, I know."

He came to a corner of the room, where four Narutos were speedily sorting papers. He grabbed one. Almost every word was covered in a line of black - censored beyond recognition. Even the seals at the top had been disrupted. It looked like someone had taken pins and coated every inch of something as large as a salt shaker with it until it resembled the world's most painful hairbrush , then used it to erase the seals's imprints. The only real words he could make out were "and" and "of" and occasionally "therefore". He poked the nearest sorter. "Are all the papers like this?" The clone nodded.

"Dammit!" Naruto growled. "Isn't there a single helpful thing in here? Anything! The Yondaime! Kazama Arashi! Hell, shouldn't it be easier to find information if they're the same person?" He slammed his fist against the side of the shelf, and cursed when something heavy fell on his exceptionally "durable" head. "Life just keeps gettin' better and better." He rubbed his head, and watched as what looked like a tube rolled under the shelf.

He dropped to the floor, reaching after the offending object until his arm under the shelf all the way to his elbow. His fingertips could just brush the edge of what felt like leather, and he bit his lip, using a new variation on an old shinobi trick to gather chakra to his fingertips. Normally, shinobi used tiny, tiny bits of chakra to keep an extra grip on their weapons or to exploding notes. He'd tried this, but found that when he didn't pay attention, he'd glue his hand to whatever he was holding. That became damn embarrassing with that dirty magazine he'd been trying to plant in Sasuke's backpack. He did find another use for the technique, though, during one of his many pranks on Iruka-sensei. He'd discovered that, when chakra gathered, sometimes miniscule amounts of air was displaced, even if you were using the "glue" version of it. Depending on how you gathered the chakra, the wind would blow in a different way or in different quantities. He knew that this didn't just happen around him - hell, he'd seen Sakura's battle aura blow like a hurricane before - but didn't know why his was the only use really developed into it.

He had to place full concentration on this and cringed as he felt the "info overflow" as some of the more idle clones dissapated. Put gently, his chakra control sucked worse than cold ramen, but he always seemed to get by. He pushed chakra towards his fingertips, feeling the prickling of the hairs on his arm as he pushed more through his wrist. He let some pool there, feeling the slightest movement of miniscule air currents before pulling all his chakra back at once, leaving his hand in place. His chakra had displaced air, and when he'd pulled it back inside, the wind he'd gathered had pulled what he now saw was a scroll case into his waiting hand. He stood up and brushed large kitten's worths of hair off.

He picked at the wax seal on the scroll with his fingers, peeling it off mostly intact. The seal was decorated with the symbol of the leaf, small nicks in the actual swirl showing the authenticity of the symbol. When he'd been much younger, in between ditching school and ditching whichever foster home they had tried to put him in, he'd spend hours upon hours with Sarutobi, either in his office or watching the "creepy mask guys" he now knew to be ANBU watch him watch them watch him. Sarutobi's seal for important documents had been almost exactly like this, but the grooves had been different - there were even different numbers of grooves in the seals for different kinds of messages. He'd never understood it, but some members of the Old Man's staff could tell what a message was about even before opening.

Naruto was good at that, too, but mostly because he knew that, whenever he got an Official message from the Hokage's office, it wasn't ever a good thing.

He glanced closer. There, in the middle of the Leaf's spiral was something definitly not in Sarutobi's - an extra curve that was so faint that it could've been excused as a taint in the wax. He frowned. There was something odd about this seal - something that he could almost place. He moved to scrape the wax on a nearby shelf, already preparing to open the scroll with the other hand when the wax suddenly grew boiling hot, making him inhale sharply, grasp tighter onto the parchment, and lean against the shelves.

It was just his luck that the last of his bunshins dissapated in that moment, adding info overflow to his list of problems. It was actually fortuitious, because with his mind preoccupied on sorting all the excess knowledge he'd learned about dozens upon dozens of genin teams and their members that he completely missed the acidic pain of the wax seal forming onto his finger.

It cupped around his index finger's tip, rolling over the fingernail and pooling at the fingerprints, hair-thin trains of wax rolling along every swirl and line until hitting a knuckle, than another, and only stopping at the very base, where it met with the rest of his hand. The wax bit suddenly into his flesh, and he was so drawn into his own memories that he missed the few drops of blood mixing with the red wax.

As suddenly as it began, the wax retreated, liquid pulling back until it drew back on the edge of his fingertip at an unnatural angle. It disapeared into smoke, and when Naruto woke up from his sensory saturation, it (and the small hairs on that finger) was gone.

"...what the hell?" He shook his head like a dog shaking dry from water. "Crap. That cocky clone was still mixed in there." He sighed, and his gaze was drawn suddenly towards the scroll, which in his hand was starting to unfurl by itself. Eyebrows arched high, he pulled it open the whole way, his already tested reflexes nearly missing the small object that dropped in the process. He put the scroll, still open, on a shelf, and fingered the object

It was a ring, made of silver or something like it, with a simple band with a single flourish at the front; a signet. Naruto realized with shock that it was the mirror image of the symbol on the seal, right up to the small "m" in the center of it and the hairline second swirl that followed the Leaf's. He wondered briefly how the seal could be made when the design's press had been _inside_ what it'd sealed.

Absently, he slipped it on his finger. The ring was much heavier than it looked, and Naruto grinned at it. "So, this is what it's like. The Old Man wouldn't ever let me touch his. Said some bullcrap about it melting my finger off."

Fox grin still on his face, he glanced at the scroll, and suddenly was quite glad he had laid it down. Otherwise, he would've dropped it in his shock. On the center of the parchment was a map of Konoha. Instead of individual buildings being noted or outlined, regions of the city were shaded. The former industrial district was in red, while the commerical district, circling around the square, was in blue. In between were snatches of yellow, for what he guessed was residental lanes and blocks, and what seemed like white, with small stars on large white blocks around the edges of town. In tiny, illegible script were names - if Naruto hadn't already known that they were the compounds of the huge clans, he'd never have figured it out. He counted them all. The Uchihas dominated the map, with, surprisingly, the Aburames coming second. They had a huge colony to themselves near the forest. The forest itself was colored in green, and had small dotted lines drawn throughout it - paths, he guessed. One led to the Akimichi section, a place which, like it's clan, was too huge to completely fit on anything. The edge of the map had arrows pointing off screen, and small farms which he guessed were peaset run bordered the Akimichi plantation. The Naras had a small hamlet to themselves, one block of white larger than the others, but also deeper into the forest near a striped green area marked "DEER".

There were several names he didn't recognize. The Saotome section was plotted over what Naruto knew were now natural hot and cold springs. There were small gatherings of Uremeshi and Son houses where a plotting of training grounds were now, but Naruto hadn't heard of anyone in the village with those names. Squinting, Naruto could just make out a splotch of grey near the base of the mountain. It had no name, but was circled with pencil several times, and there was a badly drawn arrow from it to the base of the Saotome lands, where it circled around, and another arrow connecting it to a small home on the other side of the mansion. There was the helpful subtitle of "ROCK" on the mountain.

Naruto noticed a distinct lack of a name he _did_ know that wasn't there, and should be. Peering closer, he noticed one block that hadn't even been colored in. Inside it was written, vehemently, "Bastards live here." They were Hyuuga lands.

The discrepencies grew greater in number from there. The Hatakes had a section that Naruto hadn't even heard mentioned once in his lifetime. The Harunos weren't even blips on the radar, but there was a family called "Tsukino" with a circled house or mansion near a path leading off the map. He had noticed Shikamaru and Chouji's clan names on the map, but he didn't see Ino's family's lands anywhere, if they ever had lands.

No where on the map did he see the name "Kazama" or "Uzumaki, but he DID see the work of Kazama Arashi's pen everywhere. Snide comments were just barely visible on the colors - the Hyuuga one made him laugh. Near the Akimichis was the comment "Cow Tipping Traps", which confused him, and "Side Saddle _only_" on the "DEER" section, which gave him a few wonderful, horrible ideas.

This was, without a doubt, the single most detailed map of Konoha that he'd ever seen, even with the errors. While everyone in the village had a sense of where specific places were after a time, usually navigating by landmarks like the mountain, the forest, the river, Ichiraku's Ramen Stand, he'd never seen a map like this before. When they went to Wave Country those few weeks ago, Kakashi's map of the countries had been the first he'd seen. Everyone _knew _that Fire was the largest kingdom (even though it really wasn't), but it was somewhat different seeing it laid out like that, just like how it was different seeing the "Uchiha" compound and knowing that there was only one left in that whole huge compound, and man, he was a major prick.

He had to unfold the map completely to make out the date scratched in the far corner - 10/1, and a familiar year.

Six days before the Kyuubi.

Nine days before he was born.

He felt, quite suddenly, like he couldn't breathe because it'd be even more sacriligeous. There was a reason this map was so different from what he knew, and he - or what he'd been and what he still had within him - was it. It felt almost like looking at the map was looking at all the snarling faces from his past, cursing him for being a demon, or at least carrying it.

He'd heard the stories, about the Kyuubi causing Earthquakes and Tsunamis with its footfalls and tails. He'd felt the Kyuubi's monsterous aura and the endless amount of Chakra that was only just dipping into the surface of it's power. Hell, he'd been face to face with the bastard in the inside of his mind - that filthy sewer that he hoped was a reflection of the Kyuubi, and not his own thoughts. But, hearing the stories and comprehending the amount of destruction were two completely different things.

He could understand now. He understood the glares of the villagers, the hateful whispers and the snide comments behind his back. He'd destroyed entire histories - techniques and bloodline limits and families down to the last child. He just ...never knew all of what had been. Before, it was as if the teachers had singled him out because he'd been an orphan, and he had hated them for it, and acted up because of it, and then relished every drop of attention he gained from it. The idea that people would _watch_ him had stunned him stupid at the time. When Mizuki had betrayed the village like the bastard he was and finally spilled the beans about the whole Kyuubi-thing, Naruto had gained a bit more insight on the whole fox-hatred thing. This, however, was something shocking and entirely different, and the clamp around his chest loosened all at once as he realized it.

He forgave them.

He thought back, his earliest memories of bright colors and of frowning nurses. When he was a kid, he thought he saw ghosts haunting the windows of the orphange - ghosts with animal faces he now knew to be the ANBU symbols. He had tried not to memorize that particular lesson in the academy, but it was quite easy to kill a child, especially a new born. Starvation would be too obvious, but within a year, a child could pull itself over it's crib bars and fall to the floor "accidentally". Suffocation was also a possibility - a toy too close, or a blanket too snug, or even laying the child down the wrong way. A nurse could've handed him to an irresponsible child who wouldn't have known (or cared) enough to hold up his head - his neck might've broken. Who knew how early the Kyuubi had been healing him - he might not have lived through heatstroke or frostbite. He might've died if they'd put poison in with his formula or if they'd never given him vaccinations and just thrown him in with the other children.

But, he didn't die. He survived another day, another week, and then another year. Every hour was a landmark, now that he thougth about it, because these people were grieving, and angry, and confused, and trying desperately to live in a village decimated by something they couldn't understand or hope to defeat, until their favorite hero died, seemingly to give the Fox a new body.

Naruto believed truly and with all his heart that one day, he'd become Hokage, and one day, every villager would respect him for all that'd he accomplished, and not see him as the "Damned Demon Fox", the murderer of their loved ones, their clans, their village, and their hero. But, looking back on it, he completely understood why his life was like it was.

As a baby, he wasn't anything but "the Fox". Wounds still fresh in their minds and on their bodies and apparent in the crumbling facades of their buildings, the people of the village needed something - anything - to hate. Their hero was dead, but the murderer was alive, and it was so easy to hate someone who couldn't fight back - couldn't protest.

If Sarutobi had not made the law about the Demon fox, he would've probably died shortly after he learned to speak. What cruel person would've cooed sickening things into his ears, until he repeated it around the wrong traumatized shinobi? He was certain, looking back on it, that he had said evil things, sickening phrases he couldn't and didn't understand. These things made it easier for the people to hate an innocent, a child whose only desperate desire was touch, was love.

It had been twelve years since he'd been born, since he'd been hated nearly day in and day out by practically all around him. Habit, for shinobi or for civilian, was a very hard thing to break. Perhaps it was even harder for Naruto to prove himself to the shinobi than the villagers. Naruto, for one, was ruled by instinct, and shinobi had to at least have some when it came to danger. The fox, Naruto knew even through secondhand exposure and the memory of terror half-heartedly hidden on Kakashi's face when he's asked about the seal's strength after the battle was over on the bridge, was a creature of pure and malevolent darkness. "Evil" was too loose a term because it implied there was a single good strong enough to balance the crawling, devouring fear and horror the fox's mere presence induced.. It was said that only shinobi at the battle saw the final end of the Yondaime and of the start of Naruto's story. But, there were precious hours before the Sandaime's law was carved out of desperation, hours in which loose tongues spread rumors and lies, and soon a myth spun of hatred and anger and fear took a reality far darker and more dangerous than any orphaned newborn could ever be.

Konohagakure was the most beautiful place in the world. There was no other city, no other place in the world that he'd rather protect with his life. These were the people of his village. These were the people who'd glared and spat at him, humiliated him and tried to kill him (though, the ANBU were so efficient that he rarely thought about the death threats and the assassination attempts until he'd gotten out of the academy and most of the ANBU had left - as far as he knew.), and who had made him feel as if his very existence was only to be hated.

If it hadn't have been for his "precious people" - Iruka, Sarutobi, and now him teammates and Kakashi-sensei - he would've become what the villagers had fear he would be. He would've been a monster of their own design.

But, Konoha was a village full of monsters in human skin, and humans within the skin of monsters. Naruto forgave because he understood. Sasuke hadn't actually died on the bridge, hadn't actually said his last words to Naruto after mutual exchanges of hatred - but it felt like it. It stabbed in him more than senbon ever could dream - not just the death of Sasuke, the bastard he'd only begun to know, his first "best friend", but the guilt. Sometimes, it was all Naruto could do not to hear all the mistakes he'd made come back at him. Sometimes, it really was better to be a fool than to be regretful later on. Now, his nin-do was a path without regrets, facing forward into what could only be a brighter future, even if he had to pave it brick by brick, and break down Konoha person by person until it, as a whole saw what only a few had realized.

Everyone was a monster. Rage, hatred, sadness drive men and women to the brink of sanity and then past it, forcing them to regret their lives, their actions, and their words. Grief drives people mad. Naruto's inner demon was corporeal - that was the only difference between "him" and "them".

"What now?" He found himself muttering. His hand shook slightly, still hovering above the scroll, the weighty ring of the Yondaime on his finger, awkward and loose on his child's fingers. He refused to cry again, refused to look back on tonight and think about how he could've spent his time better. He would build on his childhood, the past mistakes he'd made and the clumsy failures he'd make a thousand times over in a single day, and from it, he would grow, and his way of the ninja would grow as well.

Silently, Naruto folded up the scroll and placed it back in the sealed container. He sat the case on the shelf with the rest of the Yondaime's confidential documents. Then, he stopped, and placed it with Kazama Arashi's mission reports instead. He never noticed that the slight bit of red wax still on the leather seemed to stretch back into place as if it'd never been touched.

Haruka and Makoto were waiting outside. The BIRCH office was clean, and he was full of the knowledge of a hundred clones and a hundred stories (and millions of small by-laws that no sane person needed to know.). In that moment, Naruto felt as if his life had changed for the better, as if a weight a thousand times heavier than any boulder could dream of being had rolled off his shoulders and was thundering behind him, growing fainter with every step he took forward.

Naruto Uzumaki felt as if he had changed. This was true. He felt as if the world had changed. This was also true. He also felt that, from that day forward, nothing in his life would ever be the same.

He really had no idea.

* * *

This chapter was insanely hard to get out. Don't worry; I already have the next chapter planned. A question for all of you, though. Are there any blindingly obvious continuity errors I'm not seeing yet? Remember; this is your chance to criticize someone to your heart's content! Thanks for all the reviews, too, and page hits and the general feel of recognition. Man, I can see why some people get addicted to this. 


	4. Clouds, Gusts, and Sunshine

Chapter 4

Naruto didn't think that the world outside the BIRCH office looked noticeably different. The sun wasn't shining any brighter, though it was still the same hellish degree of hot it'd been when he went in. It was probably going to be slightly milder at dusk before suddenly dropping fifty degrees and making people close their windows and get out blankets, until the temperature rose another sixty shortly before dawn. The weather liked to screw with people like that, especially in the summer.

To his eyes, those innocently fluffy clouds on the far horizon even looked like rain, quite likely the thunderstorm that Kakashi had predicted. He'd have to check with Shikamaru if he wanted an accurate forecast, though. The Nara family seemed to gaze at the sky for at least five hours a day - and that was just when Shikamaru and his old man were doing "family training". In total, Shikamaru probably spent more hours watching the sky than Kakashi spent reading his dirty pervert books, despite the fact that it seemed like he'd need to bend the fabric of time to do so. Because of this, he could accurately predict the weather for at least two days at a time, including whether or not and how much it would rain, what kind of wind there'd be, and, on occasion, he'd even tell how likely it was that his mother allergies would start up. His father could predict the same thing for up to ten days, but could also tell you when the lowest and highest temperatures for that day were, going back over fifty years.

Naruto had once tried to cloud watch with them, safely hidden from their view behind a grove of trees but close enough to hear their occasional mumbles. He'd lasted about thirty minutes before his body absolutely wouldn't let him lay still long enough for him to think clouds looked like anything more than dango or pocky.

Food brought his mind to his stomach, and his stomach brought him back to reality again. With a jolt, he saw quickly that his feet brought him right in front of Makoto, who still sat on one of the stone benches. Haruka next to her, holding one of her mother's hands in her own. Both were watching him.

In that instant, the same painful, striking guilt that had hit him while looking at the map gutted him here as well. He'd been thinking about dinner and the clouds, and whether training tomorrow would take place in a foot of mud and in ninety degree temperatures while these two exhausted women were waiting to find out if their son, their brother, their _family_, was dead or alive, or if he'd never even passed through this town at all.

There was a brief, crippling silence when all that Naruto could look at was the unreadable glint in Makoto's eyes and the redness of Haruka's cheeks and the quiver of her lips. Haruka kept inhaling deeply, the sound echoing in Naruto's ears as sharply as if the fox had been focusing it's enhanced senses on it, too. Makoto moved to speak, but stopped and shook her head.

Naruto had always hated silences. Whenever his teachers asked him a question, and he didn't know the answer, they'd always hang on that moment as long as they could, pointing out his ignorance with nothing more than a shake of their head and the comment "Maybe you'll do better than Uzumaki." as they moved onto the next person. It was part of the reason he'd become the class clown. Even the derisive laughter of his peers was better than listening to the seconds inch by. From an early age, he'd found that filling the silence with something - chatter, the tap of his shoe on the floor or his fingers on the desk, a hummed song - made him feel less alone.

In the academy, they'd been taught the ways to tell a comrade of a teammate's death. They'd been told how to tell a customer about the deaths of their loved ones, and how to report the death of the customer in mission reports. Ninja were exposed to dozens of different kinds of deaths in their careers, and had to be able to personally cope with them all. Part of being a successful ninja was being able to function after disaster struck, and part of being in a team was about helping their team mates move on, too. However, Naruto hadn't been taught how to deliver news like this to two women who already looked like they had enough problems on their plate without the death of a relative. The thought of talking to them, telling them the bad news himself felt like betrayal, and he didn't quite know why.

"Well," he heard himself saying, habit moving his mouth even before his brain had time to warm up, "I have good news and bad news. Which do you want first?"

There was a silence, but it was as different from the awkward pause just seconds before as oil was from sake.

"...The good news?" Haruka ventured, glancing upwards with eyes that no longer glistened with tears, but instead looked forward at him with confusion and surprise.

"The Yondaime was the strongest ninja in the entire village of Konohagakure. He almost single-handedly defeated an entire army of Rock-nin, and led our forces in a victorious war that had the fewest civilian casualties in history. He wrote dozens of laws protecting the rights of women and children - both civilian and ninja - and pretty much rewrote how Konoha treated their captured prisoners." He paused for breath, amazed at all the little tidbits he completely forgot learning from the paperwork in BIRCH, and Makoto watched him with knowing eyes and what could've been a smile on her face. "To this day, he is regarded as Konoha's greatest hero, and he died defending the town he loved."

"The bad news?" Makoto asked, her eyes catching the telltale shifts in Naruto's posture.

"Kazama Arashi was a good man, a good ninja, and..." he trailed off, licking his lips. Makoto stole the moment.

"And he was the Yondaime, correct?" Makoto stood, ducking her head down. Despite the angle of her head, Naruto swore he saw a twitch on her cheek. He thought she was shaking, and wondered again if he'd have to visit the hospital today on top of it all. It seemed like a second passed, and then another, and then suddenly, she was in front of him and engulfing him in her thin, yet surprisingly strong arms. She bent at her knees, and Naruto followed with her to the ground, his arms stumbling on their way to find her shoulders.

He felt her head fall on his shoulder, her arms clutching at his back as she shook, just slightly. He heard a sound muffled in the thick fabric of his jacket, and his tongue fumbled.

"Aw, hell. Dammit, I knew I shoulda done it some other way. Look, what I meant to say was that ... W-wait! Stop sha-... oh, dammit, I made you cry." He sighed, and started to unlock himself from the embrace.

She laughed.

It wasn't anything he expected. She wasn't crying, she hadn't gone insane, and it wasn't a bitter, sarcastic bark. It started as giggles, and she noticed his wide, staring eyes, and tried to cover her laughter with one hand. It worked for full on two seconds before she began snorting, and she fell against his chest again, one hand grasping his shoulder as the other one scrambled at the ground. She was panting for air in between guffaws, squeaks and snorts punctuating individual bouts of laughter while Haruka came from her seat and sat next to them, one hand pulling on her mother's shoulder until the much older woman sat back, cheeks still red and tears glistening at her eyes. She wiped at them, examining her fingers almost solomnly before she burst into giggles again.

He revised his opinion about her going insane.

"I-I'm sorry, Naruto-san." She screwed up her face, seeming to bite her knuckle and try to suck on it at the same time. "It's just..." She glanced up. "I'm happy."

W-what? That had definitely _not_ been the reaction that Naruto had been expecting. Haruka glanced over her mother's head, and shared his exact expression.

"Arashi," she breathed fondly, "was a beautiful baby. He was all leg when he was born, and more than a week overdue." She curled her legs into the yoga-style, and whether it was the shine of the sunlight on her pink-tinted face or the smile that stretched over her as she fell into memory, she looked at least ten years younger, filled with a robust health that didn't seem to match with the frail woman he ran into this morning. "He was always a clumsy boy, trying to adjust to his long arms and his chubby fingers, always getting everywhere he wasn't supposed to, and then getting stuck there." Her hand rubbed her chin, but couldn't hide the smile on her face as it switched from a smile to a grin, then to a smirk, and then through dozens of different phases of happiness. "He was such a crybaby when he was a boy, always running to me and clutching my skirts." She smiled at her daughter, "Much the same way you used to cling to your father's leg whenever he came home. He used to carry you around the entire house like that, and you used to squeal." She sighed, fondly. "You both carried on, so."

"Mother, I don't understand why you were laughing so. Arashi is...Arashi is dead, mother!" Haruka exclaimed, tears left idle on her cheeks.

Makoto turned her smile on her daughter, rubbing one hand on ruddy cheeks and smoothing away tear trails. "You were so young - you hadn't even been born when he left, and you were just a baby when he and his friends would visit with that odd old man." She twisted her head towards Naruto. "He was recruited by one of your ninja when he was just a boy, perhaps seven or so." Her gaze turned inward. "He might've been younger. Or older. It just seems like such a long time." She paused. "But, you see Naruto-san, Arashi was such a happy baby, then such a happy child, and finally such a happy man." She closed her eyes, gazing at angels on high. "I know now that he is happy in death." She snickered. "He's probably showing up his father at this instant. A _Hokage."_, she muttered, a fox grin stolen from Naruto sneaking it's way onto her.

"Naruto-kun," she started again, taking one of his hands into both of hers, clasping around it as if in prayer, "thank you."

"Hey, I didn't do anything!" he protested, not knowing whether or not to inch away as she leaned closer to him. He was thankful that the afternoon's smoldering heat dissuaded most people from trekking down this merchant's street. Most vendors had already closed their stands, and the dusk seemed to be creeping over the alley, casting everything in shade.

"You probably wondered why I was laughing," she started, and Naruto nodded cautiously, attention split between her and Haruka, who seemed to nod with him. "My husband, bless him, said that Arashi would be back home the day after he was recruited. Then, that day, he said Arashi would come home in a week. Then a month. Then a year." She looked up at Naruto. "And so on. After that long, Toppu - my husband, that is - said that Arashi had tripped on a sword and stabbed himself, or did "one of those damn ninja tricks" and vaporized himself."

She almost pleaded with Haruka to see the humor. "Don't you think your father, if he were alive, would just DIE knowing that Arashi became the town hero? The town's LEADER, no less!" She threw her head back, and instead of laughing, gazed upwards. "Oh, Arashi. You could've _told_ me."

Naruto's eyebrows scrunched together in confusion, and Haruka glanced at him. In the same moment that he pulled his hand away from Makoto's loosened grip, Haruka took it up in hers. "You see, when I was a child - oh, this had to be about fifteen years ago, and probably more - he would come to the house for brief visits. Sometimes they'd only be for a half hour, and other times he stayed for days on end. He would come as quickly as he left, and always unseen. This wouldn't really be important except that we lived on the small area where the Lands of Earth, Grass, and Rain collide." Naruto's eyes widened.

"But, that has to be at least a week from here! He was a ninja - how did he get time off enough to travel so far?", Naruto protested, trying to remember the map Kakashi had shown him. Grass was a fairly small country really only noticeable for the small amount of ninja who'd remained neutral in the Rock-Leaf conflict only through the fact that they were exceptionally good at hiding from both sides. He knew nothing about the Land of the Rain except it's name and the hazy idea that it was located somewhere to the west and north of the Land of Fire. The Land of Earth housed the Rock Nin, who the Yondaime had been at war with more than a decade ago.

"A week? Perhaps at ninja speeds. For normal people, it takes MONTHS. There are twisted valleys of impassible rock that ninja can simply bound through, but that need to be detoured for miles and miles on end when traveling by caravan." At Naruto's dropped jaw, she continued. "I was just a little girl when he started appearing like that - before, we would get bundles of letters dated back months due to the lag, and it was like peering into someone else's diary. He'd been training, he'd been in the Fire Kingdom months and months away from us since before I was born. Then, he just appeared out of thin air one day and scooted his way back into the house. He never gave us a good explanation for how or why he would come like that - he said it was a secret ninja technique, but he never could tell a lie without bursting into laughter afterwards - and whenever we asked, he'd avoid the subject. He avoid talking about anything in this village, actually. It was like trying to cut water in half getting him to tell us anything about his training, his life, or his town. Of course," and she snorted, "he couldn't keep a secret for long, and most of that slipped out eventually, one way or another."

She shook her head. "I'm telling this wrong. Then again, I'm not sure any story with Arashi in it could ever be simple." Slowly, Haruka stood up, and tugged Naruto upwards. Both turned to help Makoto, who'd been far ahead of them and was already brushing herself off with the same dazed smile. Haruka moved to the bench again, and Naruto noted the odd way she sat with her back arched, as if her weight was badly distributed.

"Arashi had to be one of the strangest people to have as a brother." Haruka started again, her hands free and suddenly in a flurry of movement as she rolled them to emphasis her point, and used them for punctuation in almost every statement, "Well, I had to learn first off that I _had _a brother. I knew about it in much the same way that I knew that the sea was blue - through stories. He was ten years older than I was - about eighteen when he first showed up like that and well, when there's an age difference like that between siblings one of them is just bound by natural law to hate the other one." She snorted. "I managed to hate him for about half a day before he took me aside and showed me "damn ninja tricks"."

Makoto's eyebrow rose. "I remember those quite clearly. You were convinced that you replaced yourself with your stuffed panda for three days, and made us serve it dinner first because "you" were hungry." Makoto glanced around, noting for the first time the way the shadows stretched completely over the alley like a veil, while the sky burned above. "Speaking of dinner, Naruto-san, would you still like to go? It's the least I can do for you after you've given me my son's fate."

"W-what? You wanna pay? No way!" He started, jumping to his feet easily and coming to point at Makoto with a finger outstretched without even realizing it. "Er, damn. I meant to say that, well, you have no idea how much I can eat, and Ramen was my idea in the first place..."

"No, really. It's only polite for me to give you what I can. Think of it as an apology for bumping into you this morning, or a reward for doing such a good deed, if you please." Makoto began walking, her head held high and her pose as regal as any queen's. It wasn't a shinobi's grace, instead some sort of inner dignity that seemed to creep onto the stones and cause anything around her to just fade around her, framing her in sight. Some shinobi could read the tiniest, slightest twitches in a person's frame. Apparently, it took natural talent and years of practice to use against other shinobi, but when it came to Makoto, you'd have to be blind not to see that there was no arguing with her, not with the way she held herself in that moment.

Despite himself, he followed, and as Haruka gathered up their things, he took Makoto's pack instead of handing it forward, and surprised Haruka by taking her pack and piling it on top. In total, it was still three times lighter than his Wave Country supplies, and didn't even phase him.

He jogged ahead backwards, keeping his eyes fastened on the older woman as she walked forward with some new, unrecognizable new energy inside of her. Naruto couldn't pin it down as either hope, because he'd seen that in her eyes when he'd gone into BIRCH, or happiness, because he'd certainly seen more than he ever thought he would when she'd had her laughing fit. Instead, it was as if something inside of her had clicked, and then that something had struck something else, and all the different hidden, idle parts of her were shocked into motion, much like an engine. Whatever it was, it had to be contagious because he couldn't help but match her fox grin with one of his own. Her smile still twisted in him, and he was bent on finding out why. "Well, okay. I'll let you buy the first round only, alright? After that, there's gonna be no complaints!"

Haruka shook her head. "No complaints, then. Just stories."

He tried to glare at the two girls sternly, but Makoto only raised an inquisitive eyebrow and Haruka only shook her head with a smile. He gave it up and laughed. "Right! Ichiraku's, here we come!".

* * *

"Toppu" apparently means something like "Gust", according to my dictionary, while "Arashi" means "Storm". I originally had Arashi hailing from the border of Grass and Wind, and then realized that the map I'd been looking at was mislabeled, and that'd be a geographic impossibility. So, I took another gander at it and saw that small, intersecting region and saw a hotbed of activity. Hope you don't mind. 

Questions and comments aren't just welcome, they're needed. I had to dig this chapter out of my head with a rusty fork, so lines might be scrambled in places, and you guys will probably be the ones to see when lines make no sense.

Does anyone have a preference about chapter size or update frequency? Just asking.

(Credit to Norry again, for being my proto-beta despite not being in this fandom).


	5. Comfort and Kunai

Chapter 5

Whenever the leaders of the Hidden Villages gathered, whether it was for talk of alliance, promotion exams, or for the annual "No wars this year!" celebration, there was constant debate about whose village was the strongest, the stealthiest, the smartest, and the fastest. In most cases, these arguments were friendly, and often ended in nothing more than drinking contests or strongly worded correspondence that held veiled, but ultimately unfulfilled threats. In worse case they could, and did, start wars. But, there had been a relative peace across the known continent for just over a decade. It was a peace where with a thousand alliances ran between them and connected all villages like a spider's web, each trying to become the center of it and succeeding only in making a very strange looking web.

The wisest Kage knew that whoever reached out first to grab at another village would instead become ensnared himself, and that no village would benefit from it. Because of this, even the dullest Kage (who lasted for roughly two weeks before he was assassinated and replaced, leaving him referred to as the Tsuchikage Sanbononi, or Tsuchikage the 3rd and 2/3) respected the peace that hung between them.

The "Crown" contests seemed an acceptable substitute for full out war, as it left considerably more shinobi alive, sane, and capable of continuing to support their villages than wars ever seemed to. The occasional left-over resentment over close calls or sweeping conquests by one side were generally resolved when the next Chuunin exam came around. Champions were chosen, wagers were placed, and in most cases, the candidates from whichever village seemed to be ready for war came out looking very good in comparison, and that particular Kage came out with heavier pockets than before.

The Hidden Village of the Grass had held the "stealthiest" crown for the last fifteen years. This was greatly due to the fact that no ninja from an opposing village could _find_ the Grass Village to steal the crown back. The fastest ninja were usually Waterfall-nin. It was said that, in order to take that particular crown from them, you had to beat their champion in a race on an obstacle course located on the back of hundreds of individually located logs, each trapped in different ways, while riding down an icy river that led to a five hundred foot drop onto spires of very dangerous pointy rocks. No one had yet taken the challenge. The smartest ninja were said to be in the Hidden Village of the Sun, which had not only avoided being part in any war for over a hundred years, but also avoided being contacted by any other village in that same space of time. Many Kage had denounced the Hidden Village of the Sun as being a myth. Those same Kage woke up with strange scrolls in their beds that stated "Sun-Nin were here."

For the last seventy-five years, Konohagakure has been the undisputed owner of the Beauty crown.

It wasn't just the fact that the men from Konoha were tall and handsome, or the fact that Tsunade had escorted the Yondaime Hokage to one of the promotion exams, thus forever changing their idea of what women from Konoha were like. It was said that, seventy six years ago, the leader of the Hidden Village of the Star, which was then a thriving, prominent village, spent a single day within the borders of Konohagakure, which was then barely more than an army camp with ambition, and formally presented the beauty crown to the rather confused Shodaime Hokage the next morning.

There were hundreds, if not thousands of hidden nooks and crannies within Konohagakure, often used by shinobi as hiding places in times of war, or by children when practicing how to hide in times of war. There were an equal number of beautiful places secreted through Konoha, crammed between buildings or set within groves of trees and forgotten. Small stone statues of meditating men had alcoves for offerings and incense, while if you turned the right way down the wrong alley, you'd fine a lush courtyard which used mirrors to reflect light on a vibrant, wild garden.

There were few who knew about a certain spring on the east of the village, for example, where water so cold bubbled from the earth that it was covered in ice in the middle of the summer. There was a small collection of moss-covered tombstones that were so worn by time and tears that their names were no longer readable, set within a meadow of wildflowers in a place of honor. Only a select few had ever spread out above the Yondaime's visage in the fall, where on a certain day the sky blazed and burned and contorted upon itself in a thousand different shades of fire, and the autumn breeze caught, all at once, the red, orange, and yellow leaves from a million trees and waltzed with itself in twisted knots and smooth streams far above the thoughts of Konoha.

Naruto Uzumaki had seen all of these, and knew a hundred more besides. He knew the cool stone arches that had the long forgotten names of lovers carved in it, and had traced every indentation a hundred times. He had slept in the tree that all the children of Konoha tied ribbons and bells to (though, no one quite remembered why). He had come upon the ruins of a stone cathedral, overcome by the forest and devoured by ivy, and watched the full moon rise through elegant stained glass.

All of that beauty, however, was pale and sickly compared to the single most beautiful thing in Konoha.

Ichiraku's Ramen Stand.

Narato inhaled deeply, his limbs at once sagging from relaxation as much from exhaustion. He smiled back at the two women warmly, and marched up to the counter. As if through a second sense, the man standing at the counter glanced up.

"Naruto!", he exclaimed, grin stretching on his face almost as wide as his arms as he flung them open. "What'll it be today? I got miso so fresh y'wouldn't believe it, and the chicken - man, I saw a lady in here who marched off straight to the cemetery 'cause she knew nothin' better than that chicken was gonna happen in 'er life." He jerked his head upwards, his glance shifting to Makoto and Haruka. Naruto felt something odd when he noticed that his favorite old chef was looking almost sternly at the two women. "These ladies with you?" he asked, puckering his lips.

"Yep! Meet Haruka and Makoto! They're really cool old ladies!" Naruto announced with a grin, until he heard chokes not just in front of him, but behind him too. Opening his eyes, Ayame, his favorite waitress, was covering her mouth with one hand, amazement in her eyes. He turned around, his shinobi danger-sense suddenly deciding to claxon and ring very, very loudly, and found Haruka open-mouthed, her face slack.

"Er, well, I mean... Geez, it's not like it's a bad thing to be old. Hell, Makoto, you're amazing for being eighty."

"...EIGHTY?"

His ninja danger sense was telling him to run very far, very quickly. The rest of his senses, though, moaned and complained and refused to let him leave because ramen was so very close. The chef made a universal hand gesture, one engrained in the primal memory of every male - a quick slash across the throat. "Aw, damn." He turned to Makoto, who had covered her mouth with her hand after her outburst, her cheeks red. "Well, you're damn pretty, with your eyes and your smile and all. You should be proud about that! Women half your age would be jealous!" Desperately, he tried to salvage the situation, waving his hands frantically in front of him as he spoke. He bumped into the bar where Teuchi was standing, and glanced back at him. "At little help?" he whispered. "Please?"

"Naruto", Makoto began, and said blonde in question was very confused as to why he hadn't been hit by two angry women yet, "I _am_ a woman half my age."

"...huh?" His danger senses wavered off as she spoke, her voice calm and soothing.

"I'm only fifty two." She gestured with her arms in front of her, beckoning his gaze. "Really." He saw her ragged clothing, her haggard stance. He glanced at the slightly sunken look in her cheeks, and the circles around her eyes. He even sighted crows feet around her eyes, and creases around her lips which even now were pulled into a slightly grim smile. He glanced back to Haruka, who was covering her eyes with one hand. Through her fingers, he thought he saw a curve of the lips.

"Well, hell." He looked back up to the Old Man. "They're officially allowed to beat the crap out of me now, right?"

The chef nodded, and then cringed as his daughter slapped the back of his head.

"Father! Stop being a bad influence!" She turned her gaze toward Naruto and bent forward slightly, an empty serving tray against her chest. "This isn't the time for them to beat you up, Naruto. This is the time where _you_ apologize." She glanced to the pair of refugees. "After you grovel for an acceptable amount of time, _then_ they're allowed to hit you. They can repeat this as long as necessary" She paused. "But first," and she straighted up, turning to the pair and bowing deeply, "I'm Ayame, and this is Ichiraku Ramen, home of the best ramen in the Land of Fire!"

"Bah, just Land of Fire? Ichiraku Ramen is the best ramen in the entire world!", Naruto crowed, arms out. "I'll beat up each any every person who says otherwise!" He glanced around. There were still a few customers in the far booths, but they were mostly regulars, and so were used to the stand's most consistent regular's usual behavior. As if practiced a thousand times (which wasn't far from the truth, actually), all of them bent back over their food and used whichever hand was closest to block him from view. "Er..." he trailed off, feeling one large hand tapping his shoulder.

"Naruto-san," his chef said, "It's not like Ayame and me don't 'preciate your advertising and all, but y'do remember number 8 of the Great Ramen Accord?" He gestured with a large arm to the wall, where what looked like a cocktail napkin was framed in a place of honor, which, coincidentally, it was. Naruto peered closer, and grinned.

" "Number 8. An indoor voice doesn't mean that it should be heard _in_ the house next _door_." You actually framed it! Man, that's amazing!" He grinned, and for a moment all he knew was that returned smile beaming on the large man's face. "I can't believe you went through with it." He leaned on the counter, his eyes starting to make out his sloppy words. Teuchi reached up (when, to reach the same height, Naruto would've needed a stack of books and a step ladder, or a certain chakra training technique), and almost reverently pulled the frame down, handing it to Haruka and Makoto.

The two women glanced at it together for a moment, looked at each other, and as one looked at Naruto again. He sheepishly rubbed the back of his head. "Well, yeah. I know my handwriting sucked, but hey, I was only five at the time."

Makoto's eyebrows hit her hairline. "Five? Naruto, this is amazing for that age! Here," and she began quoting lines Naruto knew very well, "1. I, Naruto Uzumaki, Future Hokage of Konohagakure, hereby decree that when I become the greatest ninja ever, I'll make the Old Man of the best Ramen stand in the world my official Chef." She glanced up, wonder in her eyes, "You really wrote this?"

"Well, yeah. But, it took a whole week sitting at the counter there and about a thousand napkins until I finally got one that didn't look too bad. Still got the dictionary I used for it, too. I think it's holding up my window, actually." He said the last part more to himself than anyone, but he still wondered about Haruka's short wince. "We added to it over the years, you know." He sandwiched himself between the two women. Part of him thought that it was nice, mostly in a warm way, being between two girls, and from the inside of his head, he heard a very Kakashi-like giggle that he really hoped he just imagined. "See, here:" he pointed out the line, reading it aloud while haltingly making out his own hasty writing. "17. I will not compete with foreigners in eating contests, even though I totally win every time and it's their fault anyway for challenging me." He grinned. "Long story, but let's just say that there's a reason there's not one "All you can eat" restaurant in Konoha anymore."

"I ...see", Makoto murmured. "What about this one." Her finger pointed to a line roughly in the middle of the napkin, trailing off to the side and curving around the top. She twisted the list as she read, her head cocking to the side as she followed along. "9. Ramen is served in a bowl. Ramen is eaten from a bowl. Ramen should not be eaten from anything other than a bowl, or while on, in, or tied to a ..." she trailed off, glancing to Naruto with a raised eyebrow. He peered over the frame, glancing at the rule to refresh his memory. She pointed at the rule in question, and he winced. "Does that say heating duct?"

"Oh!" Ayame interrupted, snickers overcoming her as she tried to fight them off. "Good old Rule Number 9." She shared a fond smile with her father, and several customers nodded as a wave of soft conversation swept through the room, shortly followed by bursts of laughter. "Yes, that does say heating duct. It also says counter, grill, sign post, roof, coat closet, freezer, flag pole, supply room, and girl's bathroom." She poked Naruto's cheek with one finger, and he rubbed at it with a pout in her direction. "We're going to have to edit this soon to add "ceiling". You scared Tanaka-san so badly that she said she you took five years off her life!".

"Ehh," Naruto muttered, "why's she complaining? Five years off her life still leaves her with two hundred." Ayame flicked his forehead, and opened her mouth. "Yeah, yeah. Rule 3."

Makoto scanned the list, which surprisingly wasn't in numerical order, but rather in a strange list that involved numbers, letters, symbols, and what looked like crude pictures in at least three different handwritings. "3. No insulting the customers while in the store." She smirked. "Ayame-san, is there a punishment for these? I do believe that Naruto-san broke number three just moments ago..."

"HEY!" Naruto protested, "I already said I was sorry! It was in a good way!" There were disbelieving looks all around. "Seriously!" He pouted. "Fine, don't believe me."

Haruka turned her head for a moment, and Naruto noticed that it looked like she was sucking her cheek. Then, she snorted, and Ayame and Makoto laughed along with her. "Then, thank you for the complement." They were still beside each other, but Haruka placed one hand on his shoulder, leaned in close, and kissed his cheek. As she stood up, Naruto rubbed it doggedly, trying to figure out whether he wanted to frown or to latch onto her waist. He tried to think of what Kakashi would do, froze, and decided that he never wanted to think about what Kakashi would do in any situation, ever again. Instead, he followed Iruka's instruction for situations like this (which usually boiled down to "Follow your gut, but choose your words carefully and _please _keep the kunai out of it."), and grinned up at her for a moment before turning his head to Ayame, who still was watching happily.

"Hey, Ayame," he started, keeping one eye on the woman he now guessed to be around thirty (even though he'd be damned if he'd call her anything over twenty to her face), "if that's what I get for breaking number three, I'll have to do it more often." He grinned. "Heck, I can think of some things I've wanted to call that stuck up old coot Takeshi that I've been holding back on."

Ayame shook her head theatrically, but she had a smile on her face as she wagged her finger at Haruka. "Now, look what you've started. I don't know how I'll ever be able to distract him from all those kisses I owe him. But, anyway," she slyly added, glancing at the older of the two women, "you're Makoto, right?" After a nod, she drew her gaze to the daughter, and asked "So, you'd be Haruka?" Before the daughter could answer, Ayame perked up. "So, what'll it be tonight?"

"RAMEN!" Naruto shouted, wedging himself in view right between Ayame and his two guests. He was rewarded for his efforts with a hard fist on the top of his head. "Ow! Geez. Rule number 8. We went through this already!"

"Then, you should've learned it by now," Ayame replied sweetly, pulling out two menus from a small alcove in the counter. "Now, I know Naruto can probably quote every item on here in one breath, but I figure you might want to take a look for yourselves. Naruto might "forget" to mention the fact that we _do_ serve things other than ramen here."

"Lies!", Naruto hissed, but it was subdued under Old Man Ichiraku's heavy glare. The blonde sighed, hung his head, and handed the framed, famed "Rules" back over the counter. "I'll start with three bowls - the normal Miso, Chicken, and Pork - but my first and theirs are all on them." He looked to the two women. "Pork alright with you to start?" It wasn't so much a question as it was a statement. He whipped his head back around. "So, make 'em tiny bowls so they'll eat tons more on my bill, right?" Makoto and Haruka were staring at him incredulously. "Hey, I told you you didn't know how much I could eat!"

"Excuse me," Haruka inserted somewhat softly, "but Ayame-san, could you show us your wash room? I do believe that, before we would eat, we would like to prepare a bit."

"Ah!" Ayame said, nodding. "Right! It's directly back the third aisle, past the blue hanging lamp. The sign has "women" written on it, though, frankly, you can barely read it because Naruto wrote it after he broke the last one." She paused. "And the door it was hanging on too, actually."

"Hey! I didn't break that!" Naruto pouted, carefully watching Teuchi as he conspicuously scraped the grill in front of him noisily. "Alright, so my _head_ broke that, but you really should blame that chick who tossed me."

"Oi! Naruto! Bring these over to your booth, will ya?" The chef called, flinging three previously unseen bowls over the counter while Makoto and Haruka watched in horror.

For a moment, time seemed to slow as all three bowls and their contents lagged in midair. Individual strands of ramen could be made out, hot liquid beading in the frozen span of time until quite suddenly, Naruto was there, filling the space under them completely. He caught two bowls with both of his hands, the other quickly caught by the flat of his foot as he, for lack of another word, contorted to balance entirely on one leg while his upper body was low to the ground, both hands still occupied by bowls so hot that steam still rose from them. He kicked the other container in the air, his face completely nonchalant as it fell neatly on his head.

He hadn't spilled a drop.

He glanced at Makoto, whose eyes were wide, then at Haruka, whose mouth was wide and gaping. It looked like she was trying to speak, but no words came out of her mouth. "...what? Did I miss some or something?" He glanced about, the bowl on his head comfortingly hot.

Ayame leaned close to the other two women and whispered so softly that Naruto almost had to use his fox senses to listen in. "He's done that a few times before."

Haruka took a deep breath, seemed to sag, and replied gently. "No, Naruto-san." She turned towards the older woman, "Shall we change, mother?" Makoto startled, as if Haruka had sneaked up on her, and slowly nodded.

Naruto remembered shrugging off the packs at the front of the shop, nudging them next to the stack of umbrellas without owners, coats that'd never been claimed, and the small collection of various weapons shinobi had misplaced. He directed the two women to them, and whistled as he brought the bowls to his favorite booth, a corner section with blue seats so comfortable that you sank right in and couldn't touch the floor. He'd used this corner the most when he was a kid because it was nicely sheltered from the rest of the restaurant by high partitions originally intended to block out smokers from sane people. It was also slightly higher than the rest of the seats in the restaurant - there were originally some pipes in this area that a platform had been built over. Naruto had used it so much that the Old Man had actually put a small metal plaque in the shape of a fishcake, unlabelled at the center of it.

While this was undeniably the best and his favorite seat in the place, whenever he ate with Iruka-sensei or Old Man Hokage his seat was always at the front of the counter. Some of his best memories were of hazy summer nights talking for long hours with Iruka, or a few chill Sunday mornings where Sarutobi would tell him "ancient shinobi secrets", which Naruto knew now were all fake or lame, anyway. That seat had the best view of the whole of the restaurant, but it was also appreciated by a few shinobi who preferred to keep their eyes on the street.

Naruto thought that those sort of shinobi were always odd because, despite the fact that yes, they could keep an eye on the pedestrians and the customers at once, they also left their back wide open to attack whenever they did that. He'd always assumed that they were incredibly fantastic ninja who never needed to worry about being snuck upon, and that idea had lasted just up until he'd had lunch with Sarutobi and his son, Shikamaru's cigarette-smoking sensei. That guy had ruined his visions of all ninja being smart enough to think about ambushes and attacks all the time because any shinobi who did something as stupid as smoking when they had a lifestyle that required running, jumping, and kicking ass obviously wasn't smart enough to think about more than eating and talking at the same time.

Instead, Naruto came to the conclusion that it was a matter of trust. Any ninja who sat with his back completely exposed to a street full of strangers either trusted himself, like the old paranoid coots, trusted his team mates, like he'd seen whenever any of the rookie teams came over, or trusted the people around them. Naruto was, surprisingly, the last type.

Certainly, the villagers had hurt Naruto in the past. There had been a few occassions during the annual festival celebrating the Kyuubi's defeat that Naruto wished he hadn't ever left his house. The villagers had scorned him, berated him, belittled him, and abused him if not physically, then certainly mentally. It was because of this that Naruto didn't quite trust them (though, he forgave them, loved them, and would die for them, certainly).

Instead, he trusted Old Man Ichiraku.

It sounded strange to put that much faith into a simple chef, and it would be to anybody who hadn't grown up like Naruto had. There had been days when he was a child when all he'd get to eat in a day was a bowl of Ichiraku Ramen. As if he had known, bowls suddenly got larger and larger when Naruto was concerned. There was always a bent ear at the stand whenever he needed to vent, or a kind hand on his shoulder whenever Ayame passed by. There was always a smile waiting for him, always someone who knew his name. Here, he had never been turned away.

He knew that he could trust his life to Ichiraku, and he felt that every time he sat at the counter, he was showing a bit more trust in the Old Man's ability to pick up threats. He didn't know if Ayame or her father picked up on that, but he really hoped they did because he didn't know any other way to put it but in actions.

Naruto clasped his hands under his chin, letting the rich smell of pork broth wafe up, and closed his eyes. There really was nothing like a hot bowl of ramen. Some days, Naruto let the truth slip only to himself. He'd never reveal to the world, even under pain of torture, but when he was a child, he'd gotten sick of ramen in a week. He kept coming back again and again because it was like chocolate to him.

A few weeks ago, Team 7 had been sent out on a simple D-ranked mission, notable really only for the fact that it'd been their first overnight trip. Their destination was a small section of the woods well inside Konoha's borders. Their client had been a group of about ten civilian children, some of them older than Naruto was while others had been too young to enter the Ninja Academy. The children had banded together their lunch money and allowances to hire a ninja team to look out for wild werewolves near where they planned to camp.

Kakashi had, at first, treated it completely seriously, but Naruto felt that he had been at least partially joking as soon as he saw Kakashi bring out a harmonica and start to play a song which probably translated to "Thousand Years of Pain". He claimed that a loud boisterous camp would either scare away any monsters or draw them closer. Both outcomes, he'd said, would bring about the success of the mission.

Naruto, at the time, had felt that any monsters that had lived in the woods were traumatized for life. Sakura-chan had actually said as much out loud, and Kakashi had deemed their mission a roaring success.

The rest of that night had been spent on a few simple lessons of how to keep camps trackless, how to easily set up fires (Step 1: Have an Uchiha in your group. Step 2: See step 1.), and how to set up their incredibly complicated tents, sleeping bags, and perimeter alarms.

But, in the late hours of the night, as Sasuke was snoring loudly in his tent, and Kakashi was devising ways to keep Sasuke from snoring loudly in his sleep, he and Sakura had been on watch. They sat around the small fire, rubbing their hands and trying to keep away the chill that really didn't come from the air, but from the fact that Konoha was _away_ for the first time. It had apparently struck Sakura worse than Naruto, because she dug into her pack and brought out a bar of chocolate, breaking it into fourths with a smile and handing him part.

She'd called it "comfort food", and said because she ate it, she always felt, no matter where she was, a small piece of home inside of her.

Naruto's favorite food was ramen, because no matter where he ate it, he was in Ichiraku's, and there was always comfort.

"Naruto, what do you think?" A voice interrupted him gently. His head jerked up, the rattle of the bowl as a set of silverware bumped it showing the world just how off guard he was caught. He caught the rim of the bowl as it spun, expertly muffling all sound and setting it still.

He glanced up, and forgot how to breathe.

He had thought that he'd seen beautiful before. He'd fallen in love with the shine of Sakura's hair, had held a crush for Kurenai's grace for about two weeks until he'd seen her temper display itself, and had held a short lived infatuation with Ino's eyes. In their own ways, each were beautiful.

They were nothing compared to this.

Haruka had changed into a flowing blue tunic, one that had red embroidery around the curve of her neck and beaded details around the cuffs of her wide sleeves and at the very hem. She had a darker blue skirt - he knew that it was called a broom skirt, but didn't ever want to remember why he knew that - that covered her up until about her shins. She'd washed her face and put on some light make up, but it was her hair that twisted around his heart. Unbidden, a thought, a treacherous, insidious, horrible thought sank into him as quickly as razors, making it's way to the pit of his stomach where it began twisting him in knots.

It was _his_ hair, bright yellow in a way that Ino's "blonde" had never managed. He'd never seen any other person in the village manage it - hell, even other people's henges didn't quite get it right. Her hair was slightly thinner than his - he could tell because it didn't spike together quite as much. It shimmered and shone in the light, and though a bit of that was probably grease and oil, it fit her so well. There were other differences. It was his shade of yellow, but there were darker strands and streaks that could've been brown, and others on the opposite end of the scale which nearly seemed white. On her face was a thin smile, and she had hopeful eyes that, despite the make up, still seemed a bit red.

The only word that could escape his lips was "Beautiful.", because that was all that seemed to be repeating in his mind.

He tried to say more, but his mouth felt like it'd never heard of water and his mind was fighting with those treacherous parts of his body that resurrected dead, nameless hopes.

"I'm glad you approve, "Naruto-kun"." Makoto laughed, and Naruto's eyes were drawn to her.

It was like there were a thousand kunai in his stomach all trying to make their way out, or a hundred million tiny wriggling worms that would turn into butterflies and fly away if he opened his mouth another inch. He knew it wasn't the fox grabbing ahold of him and squeezing the breath and the thought out of him, because the fox never hurt like this before. Naruto, at that moment, wished he could live a thousand lifetimes of nothing but this pain, because inside of the pain was a realization he couldn't - _wouldn't_ - name because it was so precious, so fragile that if he even thought about it, it would break.

She had changed into loose black pants that cut off at around her knee, made of a thin fabric that caught every fold and wrinkle they'd gotten in her pack. Her tunic draped to her thighs, made for someone larger than her - a man, perhaps - because it fell off her shoulder, and had to be tied around the waist with a red sash that brought out the detailed, four-leaf flowers painstakingly embroidered around the neck and sleeves.. Underneath the green tunic was a darker green foundation that still seemed ill-fitting. Her skin was wrinkled and brown, with spots of pigment and some that seemed like moles, and her bones seemed to jut out too far and too sharply against her skin, like at any second they would cut through and tear her apart.

Barely brushing her shoulders on one was _his_ hair. Her hair. A part of him trembled as he named it "their hair". It was uneven on the other side, coming up to just below her ear. It looked like it'd been cut halfway and abandoned, or cut by a laymen with a rusty tool. Both probably were correct. While Haruka's hair had mainly been yellow with streaks of silver and strands of brown, Makoto's hair seemed to be mainly comprised of white and silver, with bright yellow trying to cling to supremacy.

Their facial structure, their eyes, their hair, and their frames, all shouted to the world that they were mother and daughter as they stood side by side.

He wondered what it would look like if he stood next to Makoto.

Inside of Naruto, a small, hidden hope long lost began twisting, an idea taking form and refusing to let go. Possibilites birthed themselves and refused to whither, instead building upon each other like a lotus flower in bloom.

Makoto smiled, and Naruto's heart felt like it'd been ensnared in a genjutsu.

"I take it that your response is a good thing?" She slid into the booth beside him as Haruka eased gently on his other side, setting one of their large packs beside her. She glanced down at the bowls of ramen, taking a pair of chopsticks and examining the long noodles in the light. "So, how do you eat this?"

It felt like there was still something between them, and every time he caught her eyes he thought he saw a small. Despite himself, he found his lips curving in turn, and he wondered what his body knew that he didn't. "Ah! Well, there are a lot of people who use chopsticks - mostly the traditionalists. Me? I prefer forks because you can really ..."

* * *

"So, Iruka-sensei comes bounding out of his bedroom, _covered _ in the glitter, right? So, he's grumbling and complain', but goes straight to the shower to wash it off. This was just big sequin-type of glitter, you know. So, while he's in the bathroom, I come out from under the balcony and..." Naruto's grin was almost predatory as Makoto waved one hand in front of her. 

"Wait, I can see where this is going." She burst out in giggles, chopsticks nearly getting caught in her hair as she used that hand to cover her eyes.

"So, I set out this bucket of glitter - the tiny, dust type..." Naruto gestured with his hands, nodding to Ayame as she took a few of his empty bowls and dropping off a few more full ones.

"Let me guess, in pink?", Haruka questioned.

"Pink _and_ purple, actually." Naruto replied, lifting his nose high in the air. "I only use the finest shades and hues."

Haruka chortled. "Goodness, Naruto-san. What do your parents think of all this?"

The question had been asked so nonchalantly that no other booth picked up on it, but Naruto still felt as if the entire restaurant took note of it and paused. "Well," he began slowly, his gaze turned downward as he fiddled with his bowl of ramen, "I don't really have any." Beside him, Makoto stilled. "The same attack that your son d-" he paused, trying not to concentrate on the seal in his stomach that he swore was glowing through his clothes, "well, anyway. No one really knows about my father, but I heard from somewhere that my mother died in childbirth. There's no records of any Uzumakis in any of Konoha's records, though," he mentioned, and he caught Haruka's hand covering her mouth mid-gasp. "but, well, you guys don't need to worry about that. What was it you said earlier? Something like Arashi would've wanted all parties about him loud and drunk? Well, I can't give you "drunk", but loud..." he trailed off, and Makoto smiled.

"You're right. Arashi would've liked you," she started, and if Naruto hadn't been trained to notice it, he wouldn't have caught the catch in her voice. "I'm sure of it." She leaned over the table, her bangs falling into her eyes as she used her chopsticks to pick up a small fish sausage from her bowl. "So," she continued, "you had a bucket full of glitter, and your Iruka-sensei was in the shower..."

Naruto took the bait. "Right! So, I knew that he had this fan in his closet that he used in the summer," he heard some sharp inhalations from around him, and grinned, glad that the previous, tense moment had passed, "and I took it out, setting it out in front of the bathroom door." He grinned. "So, that's pretty much why I was running away from him today."

"And he doesn't notice you doing this?" Haruka asked, one eyebrow raised. She, unlike her mother, used a fork, and dug with relish into her bowl of tofu ramen. "What kind of a ninja is he?"

"Hey! Iruka-sensei is a great ninja!" Naruto paused, fangs bared as he smiled widely. "I'm just a better one." Makoto nodded solemnly, before turning her head and sharing a glance with her daughter.

Both burst into giggles.

"Hey! What'd I do now?" Naruto had watched the two women the entire conversation. He didn't know how much time they'd spent in Ichiraku's, but customers had gradually began filling in, then filling out, and then coming back in again like a tide. Ayame danced between the tables, somehow timing every pause in the conversation perfectly with new bowls of ramen, or refills on drinks. She'd even stay for a few minutes to drop off an embarrassing anecdote every chance she could (and those moments came far more often than Naruto liked). Old Man Teuchi had even retrieved another "future collector's item" from the wall and passed it to the two girls.

Naruto knew the picture well because it'd been one of the best days of his life. It was a few days after his acceptance into the Ninja academy, and he'd manage to win the "10,000th Order" contest. Teuchi hadn't ever said how many of those were Naruto's bowls alone, but the blonde had the feeling that he wasn't just the stand's biggest customer anymore, but the biggest investor. In the picture, Ayame stood on one side while Teuchi dominated the other side, both surrounding a tiny version of Naruto who, despite the fact that they were leaning over, barely stood halfway up the picture. All three were flashing peace signs, and Naruto could _still_ feel that grin on his cheeks.

Makoto had stared at that picture for a very long time.

It had been a fantastic day, but somehow it made an even better story when told to Makoto and Haruka, who listened attentively and added their own comments throughout it. Somehow, Makoto always knew what to say to move the story along. As the night progressed, Haruka began adding in her own stories, ones that, to Naruto's amazement, portrayed the Yondaime in a whole different light.

Kazama Arashi had, for example, possessed an amazing sense of humor. As soon as Naruto had started in about his history of pranks on the village, Haruka nearly choked on a fish roll. After she'd coughed that up, she spilled about one of Arashi's disasterous pranks on the village during one of his visits home. Haruka had been around nine at the time, and had practically been attatched at Arashi's hip, according to Makoto.

Naruto had listened attentively through the story, nodding his head at some points and protesting during others ("He couldn't possibly have thrown a pig that far! See, pigs are shaped like..."), until at about halfway through where he waved frantically for Ayame and had collected an entire stack of cocktail napkins that he'd scribbled frantically on while Haruka continued, Makoto filling in a different point of view.

"Arashi used to say the same thing," Makoto said with a smile, "about being the best ninja, I mean." Fondly, she placed her head in her hand for a moment, staring off into the distance for a moment until her eyes brightened. "OH!" She exclaimed, and Naruto snorted as Ayame's head whipped around in their direction, "Haruka! The pictures!"

The daughter looked puzzled for a moment, and then her eyes widened, and she reached into the massive pack beside her and dug out a fairly sizable stack of pictures. Makoto leaned closely beside Naruto as Haruka easily leaned in the other way. Naruto pushed a few of the bowls further into the table, clearing a space while keeping one bowl on his leg and one hand occupied with chopsticks.

Haruka began laying out pictures in no particular order. Makoto saw a particular one and laughed.

Naruto looked closer, seeing a large, burly man with slightly darker skin than Iruka's, bare from the chest up and standing shin-deep in what looked like a small stream. Beside him was a short, spiky-haired blond child with a silly grin on his face, also standing half-naked and shin-deep, but this time with a large fish in one hand. Naruto had the fluttering feeling in his chest that the small child was the Yondaime. "Hey, is this a family friend or something?" He squinted closer. The man looked tall, but there weren't enough items he could judge height by in the photo. The colors were a bit oddly tinted, the picture worn from age and torn in the corner. He could make out the man's dark hair, bound in what looked like dreadlocks and decorated with what could've been rings, judging by the distinct catch in the light. He had an eerily familiar grin, and he had what Naruto could only barely make out as a tattoo on his already dark skin.

Makoto choked. Haruka had just gone to take a sip of her tea when Naruto had spoken, and had almost spilled it over the entire table before catching it. Naruto watched in confusion as the two laughed for what seemed like minutes.

"Yeah," Haruka snorted, "you could say that." Makoto shot her daughter a look.

"Naruto," Makoto began almost gently, keeping her eyes on Naruto's face, "that was my husband, Toppu."

There was complete silence. It was quickly broken.

"WHAT?!"

"Naruto! Rule Eight!". By now, it was a chorus from the other, almost bemused regulars and a few confused first timers.

"Sheesh, yeah, I know." Naruto hunched low in his seat despite himself. He paused mid-shift, waiting almost a minute with closed eyes until he turned to Makoto again. "How in HELL can this guy be Arashi's father?" Haruka passed him another photo, one in black and white and covered in lines from being folded again and again.

"Not just Arashi's father," Haruka pointed out, picking up the more recent photo and glancing at it herself, "but mine as well."

Naruto didn't answer, because his entire world was shattering.

The picture was of two people. One was obviously Toppu, because it seemed as if that man hadn't changed at all. It wasn't as if he still looked young, but rather the opposite. This picture had to be at least (and Naruto did some quick math in his head) ten years before the one set in the stream, but Toppu still looked old - about forty, but the full beard, mustache, and sideburns along with the long dreadlocks completely screwed up Naruto's already hazy age estimation abilities. Naruto could tell that this picture was at least thirty years old because, wrapped in Toppu's arms was his female self. Or, at least it seemed that way.

Makoto looked almost tiny wrapped in Toppu's arms. Her long, bright hair stretched down the front of her plain, white gown to the point where they almost seemed to blend. In her hands were a bouquet of darkly-colored flowers that he didn't recognize, and her shoulders were completely covered by Toppu's large, strong arms as he embraced her from behind. he realized that, now, Makoto was wearing the shirt he had been then. Her expression was almost serene in that shot, while Toppu's eyes were closed, his face half-buried in her hair.

Makoto leaned closely beside Naruto, one of her hands beside his leg as she peered at the photo closely. "Our wedding photo," she said finally. "I was just sixteen, and he was," she hesitated, "slightly older." She glanced at Naruto, who still was frozen with the photo in his hand, a thousand ideas whirling thorugh him.. "Arashi and Toppu were more alike than either ever realized. My children might've gained my hair, and my eyes -" she was cut off by her daughter.

"And your bony knees, and your extra wisdom tooth, and your webbed feet..." Haruka rolled her hand in a universal gesture. Her mother shot her a dirty look.

"Yes, well." She glanced at Naruto. "To be honest, most of his color was just from being in the sun." Haruka snorted. "Really." Naruto didn't answer, but Makoto kept speaking, softly enough that the next booth definitely wouldn't be able to hear her. "I believe that Arashi became a ninja partly just to get away from his own father. They were too conflicting in their own personalities - too similar, really - to be in the same household. My son left at such an early age that I can hardly remember it. That's sad, in it's own way. What was worse was that he was still just a baby. He left, and then Toppu left." Naruto turned his head to glance at her, face still impassive. "Toppu was a mercenary, you see." Now, she snorted. "Another way the men in my life differed. Arashi believed in being a ninja so strongly that he could make everyone around him feel the same way. He visited with his team mates and his sensei - what was his name, Haruka? Jiro?"

Haruka nodded. "Something like that."

"Anyway, Arashi could change your mind for you just by talking with you for five minutes. He could talk his way out of any situation, but he almost always chose the honest route." Makoto swallowed thickly.

"See, one of the things he did pick up from my father," Haruka began, raising her head up straight so that the action caught Naruto's eye, "was the idea that family is the most important thing in the world. You can't choose who your family is, and you don't need to like it, but there are bonds, however faint or distant, between a mother and a daughter, or a sister and a brother, or...", her eyes never left Naruto's.

"Or, between a grandmother and a grandson." Makoto finished, placing one hand on Naurto's shoulder.

Instinctively, he jerked away, but the way that Haruka and Makoto had placed themselves prevented him from leaving unless he destroyed the entire booth.

"Toppu always taught his children that bonds give you something to live for, and that the bonds between family are the most, for lack of a better word, divine that any bond could be. Arashi agreed, and I think that he would've... would've..." she stopped, her hands shaking.

"I believe," Makoto began, and Naruto was frozen in place because every instinct in his body was telling him one thing that he didn't want to hear, "that you are my grandson." Haruka came on his other side, placing one of her hands on Naruto's back. Both of their hands felt as if they were pressing him down, as if at any moment he would sink into the floor. At the same time, their warmth hatched a thousand butterflies and made a thousand kunais in his stomach stand on end. It felt good, and it felt painful, and Naruto didn't know what to do.

The night of his birth had been the last night his mother had been alive, and if Makoto was right, it'd been the day that his father - the _Yondaime_ - died sealing the fox. Naruto felt a wave of nausea spread through him because, if Makoto was right, Kazama Arashi had sealed a demon in his own newborn son.

He felt a great wave of coolness rush through his body fron his toes to his head in one fell swoop, and felt nothing after that.

He saw black

* * *

So, I promised myself I would have the "big reveal" that I included in the _summary_ in this chapter. That meant that this chapter would be INSANELY long. Hopefully, it's at least somewhat coherent. 

I had one "Blue Screen of Death" failure in this that still wrenches my heart.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed this! Review, if you want to. I'd love to know if my characters step over any OC-boundries, or if (and how) the story moves into irredeemably cliched territory.

My eternal thanks to all the reviewers so far, and I'm just amazed I've already had over three thousand page view for this story. Amazing.


	6. Fountains of Knowledge

Chapter 6

Shinobi learned relatively nothing in the Academy compared to what they learned in the field. While knowing the names of the first Kage of all the ninja villages did, on rare occasion, come in handy, it was far more important for a ninja to know which villages would kill you on sight in that particular month. All ninja learned basic skills of mathematics, but after learning what that needed for daily life, most shinobi concentrated on learning how to quickly count heads when in battle, with few continuing that path into the treacherous world of shinobi accounting. You were taught how to quickly bandage surface wounds, but knowing what to do when a team mates's leg is sliced off at the hip was something that wasn't quite covered in class.

While the academy could _tell_ you that it was incredibly dangerous to be a heavy sleeper, it took a gleeful, sadistic jonin instructor and his trusty bucket of water (and harmonica, and the aid of the resident prankster) to _show _ you that it usually wouldn't end well.

Another one of these very useful skills was the ability to, should one fall unconscious, wake up and still feign unconsciousness.

Naruto's "danger sense" activated first, telling his addled brain that he wasn't in any. With that, he groaned and lifted his head, stretching out one very heavy arm to feel the knob on the back of it. "What'd I hit?" He grumbled, mind still trying to recollect more than his name.

"The bench, I'm afraid," came a voice. A female voice. His _grandmother's_ voice.

Naruto regained complete consciousness in less than a second, which turned out to be his best time to date.

"Makoto!", he exclaimed, "I mean...er..." he trailed off, his eyes scanning the surroundings. Makoto was leaning over him from one side, and Haruka was still on his other. There was a bowl of ramen in his hand - recognized the scent as the same bowl he had been holding when he "abruptly lost consciousness" (he refused to think of it as "fainting" because it sounded girly, like something Sasuke would do.).

"Are you alright, Naruto-kun?" Haruka asked, honorific coming out automatically. She leaned forward and placed her hand on his forehead, and her touch awoke all the familiar insecurities. He flinched backwards, pressing hard against the restaurant's wall. Haruka drew back, biting her lip. She sighed.

Mouth bone dry, Naruto fumbled for words. A thousand phrases, questions, and trains of thought collided inside of his head, and it was all he could do to concentrate on the two women. He might've gotten a concussion, he thought, from that fall, but it wasn't like the fox couldn't take care of it. Before he could find something to say - he'd take gibberish to the uncomfortable silence - Makoto spoke, her words almost as frail as she looked at that moment. "Naruto, this is my fault. I apologize." She looked away. "Maybe I told you too soon, or maybe I shouldn't have told you at all." She turned towards him, pale and nearly shaking. She looked as if she'd stared into the face of death. She looked afraid. "I should've gotten to know you, should've let you know me more. I should've..." She sighed.

"C-can I ask you a question," Naruto ventured, his voice muted. He glanced around, and felt no one was listening. Ayame was conspicuously busing tables on the other end of the restaurant, while the Old Man was busy chatting up customers at the counter. Makoto and Haruka leaned in. Makoto had one hand on his leg, the other nervously rubbing fingers together on her lap. Somehow, having her nearby was frustrating and comforting at the same time. "Geez. Okay," he shook his head, "one question just doesn't cover it all." He tried to relax, but every way he shifted seemed to push into or pull away from the wrong thing. He sighed heavily, and followed his gut. Iruka would've been proud.

"So, I think I ...yeah, I believe you." He closed his eyes, but didn't need to see _his relatives_ (and wasn't that the most amazing term to use?) blink and gape to know that it happened. Reaching out with fox senses, he heard Haruka barely breathing, and could hear the way her fingers straightened out her skirt and tugged at her hair in nervousness. Makoto, nearest to him, "glowed" with scent.

He wondered what enhanced senses were like for someone like Kiba, who was Inuzuka and practically half-dog. He'd heard that dogs had the most advanced smell of any animal, but he really didn't think that whoever wrote the science books was anything else but a dog lover. Somehow, the idea that his prisoner's senses were second best to anyone's seemed mind boggling. There were times that the Kyuubi would focus on conversations taking place through solid concrete two buildings away. There were days when all that Naruto would be able to focus on were individual blades of grass collecting dew in the morning, and whatever Kakashi was saying in the meantime was completely missed in the struggle.

Touch was one of the hardest senses to control because he had to force himself to control it, and not let the fox near it. While the rest of his senses might have their uses, all Naruto could figure out about incredibly sensitive skin was that it was good for feeling how cold the water in instant ramen was getting. Otherwise, it bruised twice as easily, seemed to catch every individual thread in his clothing, and felt pain three times as sharply as normal. The fact that he was damn ticklish like that was a secret he'd prefer to take to the grave.

Smell, however, was something that he'd never be able to describe to anyone but an Inuzuka, or someone like them. He didn't know how it was for them, but for him, he could practically read information about people. Talking about it was hard, and he'd only ever done it inside of his head, but it didn't even make sense there. Getting someone's scent was like someone opened up a book and told him to read a passage in another language. If he was lucky, it was in a language he knew, and he might recognize most of the words. Other times, it was complete gibberish, and it was impossible to tell one "sentence" from the next because all the words - emotions, and the body triggers that betrayed them - blended together.

Naruto, for example, could tell that Makoto was filthy. He knew when he first met her that she smelled strongly of oil and polish, but those scents were masked by the sharp antibacterial soap from the bathroom, the light, lingering scent of the fragrant flowers she'd wrapped in her pack, and the almost dead memory of a man's scent on her shirt. His grandfather's scent. Then, Haruka's scent, which was confusing to sort out because she was sitting nearby, and he kept getting mixed messages (like reading two separate books about the same story, told by two different authors with different vocabularies) between them.

To say that he could tell when people were lying by scent alone was only a half-truth. First off, he was crap at doing it, because most of the time he didn't need to. Shinobi were trained in a dozen ways and then some about how to not only tell when someone was lying, but how to get them to spill the beans. There were dozens of different approaches to it, but Naruto found that the "Are we there yet?" approach worked best. If you ask anyone a certain question over and over and over, especially when they can't get away from you (like a teacher or teammate, or in most cases, a client), they'll usually spill something to get you to shut up. If that didn't work, there were the normal signs that told if you were lying, like reflexive swallowing, pupil dilation and eye orientation, and posture. Good shinobi learned to avoid these too, so shinobi body posture usually told an entirely different story than what the situation actually was. You could tell a lot by combining a bit of both.

No shinobi, however, could hide scent. Most of the time, it just wasn't something they thought about. Scent was something they used in the kitchen, and avoided using in the field. It was a secondary function, like emotion in the heat of battle. It wasn't _supposed_ to come into play, but Naruto found that battles were a lot easier when he used a bit of each anyway.

He had an explanation for that feeling that seemed to stretch from Makoto to him. He finally had a reason why he felt like all he wanted to do was grab onto her and never let go. He finally had a name for the scent that wrapped around the two women, and it was "pack". Inside of him, he realized that the dark feeling that had been building in his belly was the Fox, chanting that single word over and over. He wasn't sure what it meant, and he didn't like the fox sharing his thoughts, but he couldn't help but agree.

He could tell when people were lying when he was really concentrating on it, but his gut (the fox not included in it) hadn't gotten him killed yet, and he found that he didn't need to "read" her scent to see if she was lying. He'd known all along.

"So," he spoke, and wondered just how long he'd stretched out that moment, "is the ramen cold yet?"

He opened his eyes. Makoto blinked once, then twice. She paused, and Haruka interrupted whatever she was going to say.

"Well, it's about luke-warm..." she began, and before she could continue, Naruto plucked the chopsticks from her fingers and the bowl from her hand in less than one swift motion.

He wolfed it down voraciously, seizing the minute to organize his thoughts. The fact that it happened to be a bowl of his comfort food had little to do with it, and he stuck to that claim.

"Mphg." he choked down a few stray strands. "Right, sorry. Force of habit." He drained the last of the broth with one swift swallow, setting the bowl on the table with a heavy rattle. "I just never could let food get to waste, and letting ramen get cold seems like a criminal offense." He turned to Makoto. "Okay, right. Questions." He paused, and glanced at her. He felt stronger, chopsticks still in hand, with one hand still on the empty bowl. Take away the completely foreign presence of his completely new family, and he'd be left sitting in a booth at Ichiraku's. This was his natural habitat. He could take on the world.

"So," he began again, slightly more confident this time. "Your husband - Toppu, right? - died. How? What was he like before he croaked?" He sucked his cheek. "Okay, that came out kinda weird, but don't take it the wrong way or nothing."

Makoto almost reeled back, her throat making unconscious stalling noises. Naruto noted that there wasn't any dominating emotion on her face but confusion, and depression or anger seemed completely absent. "Well," she started, glancing at the ceiling and licking her lips, "Toppu, as I said earlier, was a mercenary. Haruka and I were used to his frequent absences."

"Yeah, and it was the infrequent returns home that really threw us off." Haruka snorted, and she seemed completely relaxed. Naruto was jealous.

Makoto shot an unidentifiable look at her daughter, who shrank back with an apology. "When we were courting," and at this Naruto mentally paused to try to figure out when the last time he'd heard "courting" used was, "he was part of the village militia. I believe," and she stopped for a moment, placing a finger to her lips, "yes, our town was part of the Land of the Rock at that time. We changed possession quite a few times. But, when the Land of the Grass took over for a spell, they outlawed any perceived threats against them." She glanced at Naruto, catching their eyes and relighting the awkward tension between them. Her hands fidgeted, and Naruto wondered at the fact that her hand was still on his leg and he hadn't done anything about it yet. "We were newly wed, and I was pregnant with Arashi at the time. He needed work, and when a group of the militia-men gravitated towards bounty hunting, he was grouped with them." She closed her eyes briefly, and really did look eighty. "The first few weeks without him were hard and lonely. I was scared, and confused, and well, you really don't need to know this." She lifted her hand from Naruto and shifted her posture so that she was leaning on the table, glancing at him through the corner of her eyes.

"It was a dangerous job," she started again, watching memories play out in front of her and speaking distractedly, "but Toppu was actually quite good at it. When the same lords who posted the bounties needed mercenaries for their jobs, he just naturally progressed to that, too. Toppu just seemed to fit naturally anywhere he went. Arashi was the same way." She glanced at Naruto, her eyes full of questions.

"Eh, sorry. Can't say I don't stick out like a sore thumb." He pinched the fabric of his jumpsuit, and Makoto laughed.

"It's not just about what you wear, or how you look, Naruto. Toppu was, well, as you saw, quite dark and quite intimidating, but it was his grand skill that he could just...just..." Her hand rolled as she searched for a word.

"Ooze?" Haruka supplied helpfully, one corner of her mouth twitching.

Naruto almost laughed at the dirty look shot at his newly discovered aunt, but Makoto sighed heavily and shook her head. "I suppose "Ooze" does say it best. Yes, he managed to "ooze" his way into villages and seem like he was born there. No matter where he went, he could get the information he needed, or he could meet the right person, or he could find, in the nick of time, exactly what he'd been looking for in the first place. It all just ...fit together for him." She looked at him. "I think that happened today, Naruto."

He raised an eyebrow, and found himself leaning on the table with her. Even leaning, she was still taller than him, and he resented for the first time just how tall the tables in Ichiraku's were. "What do you mean?" He asked, and Haruka sat back on her side of the table, one hand holding up her head as she craned her head in, obviously listening intently.

"You do realize how unlikely it is that we have met, don't you Naruto? Haruka and I only arrived in this village today, and yet we found within an hour of getting lost entirely a shinobi not only capable of finding information on Arashi for us, but one who was _willing._" She watched Naruto with eyes that he couldn't help but watch back, "Most ninja," she continued, emphasizing the first word, "would've been wary of strangers asking for information, and would've reported us straight away to whoever the authorities in this village are. We would've been interrogated, and then most likely deported from here with no information at all. I find that more unlikely than the fact that you just happened to be the _son_ of our quarry."

"Er, yeah." He rubbed the back of his head and looked away. "Well, yeah. Most shinobi would've taken you to be spies or something but, well," he paused, scratching his ear, "I trust pretty easily, for a ninja at least. I mean, it's come in handy before, but I can't say that it hasn't caused me trouble in the past."

"Arashi was the same way," Haruka said with a smile half-hidden behind a cup of green tea. "But, the strange thing about trust, Naruto, is that if you give enough of it to someone, you start getting some back." She frowned. "Not that there aren't exceptions. You said that it'd caused you trouble in the past. What did you mean by that?"

Naruto hunched forward, his shoulders drawn up high. "Well, I guess it's not something I like to talk about a lot, but well, not too long ago, I was in the academy. There was this test that we needed to do to graduate and ...well, I kinda sucked hard at one of the parts. It felt like it was the end of the world, y'know? Anyway, one of my teachers - a guy named Mizuki - told me that he knew a way I could pass. He was one of the few teachers who did things for me, and I did trust him. I mean, he was a teacher, right? You're supposed to trust them. But," and he sank further, his tone becoming duller with every sentence, "well, it turned out that he just used me to get something for him, and like an idiot, I did. Worse, someone precious to me got hurt because of it."

Makoto hummed for a moment, and Naruto turned towards her. "So, what happened after that?" she asked. "I don't know what this "something" was, but if he asked you to get it, it had to be something he couldn't touch. His intent, certainly, was then to get you in trouble. But, here you sit with us today. Why?"

Naruto quickly ran the scenario through his head. He had to choose carefully what he would or wouldn't say, and there was a lot that was tricky to explain about that night. "Well, okay. That "something" that I accidentally stole? Well, it was a scroll, and I only did it because he said it was part of the test. He said that, for extra credit, if I successfully infiltrated the Hokage's Tower and got the forbidden scroll, and then learned a technique from it, I'd pass." Haruka raised an eyebrow at him. "Hey! I already told you that I trusted him - I didn't know that he was a dirty lying scumbag!" With issues, Naruto added to himself.

Makoto turned her head, and Naruto swore he heard he laugh before she turned to face him again. "So, you successfully snuck into the central headquarters of a village whose entire way of life is based around ninja, stole a scroll that you, apparently, weren't supposed to go near, and escaped without being caught?" Naruto nodded. "You," Makoto said, placing one hand (which now seemed cool, and Naruto had no idea why) on his cheek, "are Arashi's son. You are Toppu's blood. There is no doubt in my mind. But," she smiled, and pulled her hand away, "please continue. You managed to escape with this scroll, yes? No doubt with guards trying to find you. They didn't."

"How did you...?" he cocked his head at her, trying to figure out where she was going with this. "Well, yeah. They found the scroll missing, and all the chuunin - adult ninja, basically - started searching for me. I ran into the forest because I knew it really well, and I found a place to read the scroll. Well," he deliberated with a sheepish expression, "the one technique I could understand, anyway."

"Naruto, I know that what I say might be construed as rude, so please don't take this the wrong way. You were a horrible student, weren't you?" He had to stifle the natural spike of indignation, but most of this thoughts were bent on trying to read what the roll of her hand meant.

"...yeah." He bowed his head. "I mean, it all came down to the classes. I was pretty good when it came to the athletic courses, and I don't think there's any genin in Konoha fast than I am - all the pranking helped with that. But, when it came to sitting down and having to pay attention for six hours straight? Yeah, I sucked at that." He growled, and frowned. "The teachers weren't any help either. They just throw assignments at us - well, me - and expect me to know how to do 'em. The lot of 'em were bastards. Well, 'cept for Iruka-sensei." A smile came to his face without meaning to. "Well, see, he was the "precious person" who I accidentally got hurt. That part's comin' up, actually. Anyway, he was one of the first people to ...well, treat me like a person."

"Was he the one who taught you how to read?" Makoto asked, something twinkling in her eyes that Naruto couldn't figure out. He had to stop and think about that for a moment.

"Nope. I didn't meet him until I was about seven. Or, was it eight? Anyway, we didn't really connect until a ways after that. But, no." He stopped. "You know, I can't remember where I did learn to read from. I figure it could be one of the primary school teachers." Haruka made a questioning noise, and Naruto elaborated. "See, before shinobi go to the academy, they're either home schooled, or they go to the village's public school. Civilian kids stay there until they're ancient, like eighteen or something, but if you opt to go to the Shinobi Academy, you can skip out when you're eight." He took a deep breath. "Anyway, you start civilian school when you're about four, if you really have to, and I might've learned it from there. Or, maybe someone in the Orphanage." He looked at Makoto. "Why is this important?"

Makoto laughed, shaking her head to herself before glancing first at her daughter, than at her grandson. "You know, I thought you were the one who was supposed to be asking all the questions here. Instead, I've brought us this far off-topic." She played with her hands, entwining them and raising her knuckles, before setting her chin on them. "I can't honestly say that I know where my thoughts are leading," she began, and Naruto's eyebrows scrunched in confusion. "I can only say that, throughout this entire conversation, it has struck me how extraordinary you are." She paused. "Normally, wouldn't the contents of a "forbidden" scroll be dangerous to the village? If it's not forbidden knowledge to outsiders, what does this technique that you learned do?"

Naruto bit his lip with one canine, not noticing the way Haruka stared at it. "Well. Hm. Geez. I guess it's best if I showed you." He glanced around, noting the way that all the other customers had left, and the way that Ayame was nodding off at one of the stools at the counter. The Old Man hadn't ever kicked him out of here when they were closing - hell, he once fell asleep at this very booth and woke up in the morning with a blanket draped over him - but even he could take a hint. "Okay, I'll show you."

He gathered up as many dishes as he could stack on top of each other (which, to the amazement of Makoto and Haruka, and to the constant relief of Ayame, turned out to be all of them at once) and set them in the sink. He thanked Ayame, who smiled, and passed her discreetly a rather large fold of bills. "Hey, Old man!" He said, turning to his favorite chef, "you still got the codes to my account, right?" The chef nodded. "Well, just take this and whatever tab I have out of it."

"Wait, Naruto," Makoto paused. "This account wouldn't be your bank account, would it?"

"Eh, heh." he laughed, " Well, yeah." Makoto stared at him. "Well, it's not like Ayame and the Old Man would do anything with my account or nothing. Besides, I got tired of writing checks whenever I had to pay tabs, and I'm pretty sure they got tired of having to go to the bank to cash 'em. This way just cuts out the middle man, y'know?"

Makoto nodded hesitantly. "I suppose that makes sense." She turned towards the two, bowing deeply. "Thank you for the fantastic meal." Still bowed, she shared a smile with Naruto. "I can say that it was one of the most memorable meals of my life."

"I can do nothing but agree", Haruka smiled.

Naruto couldn't help but notice by now how Haruka seemed so formal in front of people she didn't know. When he first met her, she seemed shy, almost to the point of being ditzy. Just a few moments ago, however, he'd found that she had a barbed tongue and a sharp mind, not to mention a dry sense of humor. A part of him filed away the question of just what the relationship between Haruka and her father - his grandfather, he tested in his thoughts, liking the sound of it - had been. Somehow, it was almost as if Haruka hadn't liked him. Inwardly, he wondered how that would even be possible, because if _he_ had parents, he would...

Halfway out the door, Naruto stood shock-still, not even budging as Makoto, who'd been right behind him, ran into him. He _did_ have a father. Sure, he didn't know who his mother was, but even though there was still a deep, devouring hole inside of him that a mother's touch could fill, the fact that he now knew that he had a father - a name to an abstract concept - overwhelmed every other feeling.

He thought he would pass out again, and then felt Makoto's hand on her shoulder.

"-re you alright, Naruto-kun? Should I get a doctor?" Her voice was worried, and Naruto reached up to grab the hand on his shoulder gently.

"Makoto," he breathed, and starred into her eyes - his eyes. He swallowed thickly. "I had a father."

There was a pause. Ayame was washing his dishes, humming a nameless, off-key tune to herself while her father determindly scraped off a particularly black part of the grill, cursing under his breath. Haruka was behind her mother, one eyebrow raised incredulously as she fiddled with the pack on her back. Naruto had been unable to convince her to let him carry it again.

"...Yes." Makoto replied cautiously. Her eyes widened, and she gasped, one hand over her mouth. "Oh! You just ...it just sank in, didn't it?"

As they left the restaurant, they found that the sun was already long set, the sky suddenly pitch black except for the innumerable clusters of stars forming the shapes of heroes past. There was the soft hum of nearby electric generators, and some windows were still lit by it's harsh fluorescence. Naruto walked through the side streets, alleys, and forgotten cobblestoned pathways dumbly, his feet leading him while the rest of him blindly followed.

He found Makoto's hand pressing him to sit, and discovered that they were in one of the small parks in Konoha. It was little more than a fountain surrounded by an alcove of trees, but the fountain had wide edges that let him sit down.

"No, you don't have a fever, not wounded. Just ...halted." he heard her mutter. She'd found a cloth from somewhere, most likely in that never ending bag of Haruka's, and had wet it, rubbing at his face. "Naruto, I don't know what to do."

It was such an out-of-the-blue statement that Naruto blinked, focusing his gaze on Makoto. "Wha?" He managed, part of him thankful that, at the very least, his body had a good clue of what to do.

"Naruto, I'm a grandmother for the first time in my life. I honestly don't know how to talk to you, and I can't decide what to do because part of me feels like you are a stranger, while the rest of me wants to embrace you and never let you go. There are so many things I don't know about you, so many things you don't know about me." She snorted, and sat next to Naruto slowly. He realized with a wince that, though she really was only fifty-some, her joints probably ached from whatever journey she'd been on despite sitting down at the booth for so long.

She continued on, her torso turned towards him, while she stared unwaveringly at the water, her fingers tracing ripples near the edges of the pool. "Look at tonight, Naruto-kun. After you fainted-"

"Geez. Could you call it somethin' else? That sounds so...so..." and he winced, "not like me at all."

She laughed. "Now, that seems like something a boy your age would do." She glanced up for a moment. "What is your-" Naruto picked up on that thought.

"Twelve," he said, "and I was born October 10th." He told himself there couldn't be any harm in telling her when he was born. It was a matter of public record, after all. (Although, Naruto had already had a taste of what "public record" in Konoha would be like earlier in the day.)

"Already!" she murmured to herself, quickly glancing at her fingers. "At least Arashi wasn't as young as I was." She said, mainly to herself. Naruto glanced away when she jerked her head up, pretending to stare at the almost grotesque angel spitting out water. He wondered, briefly, why anyone would want an angel that looked like it was upchucking to sit in a public square. That, of course, led him to an entirely different circle of thought, plans within plans unfolding.

He grinned. Makoto glanced at him.

"Thinking about pranks. Got any clue where I could find fifty gallons of vegetable soup?"

Haruka sat her pack near Makoto's and as she bent over, she looked Naruto in the eye. "I really, really don't want to know." She stretched, her arms over her head as her bones cracked loudly. "This, Naruto, has been a very long day." She took off her well-worn footwear, neatly placing them side by side, then faced the opposite way of her mother and nephew, and dunked her feet in the water. She hissed. "It's freezing!"

Naruto shrugged. "Konoha's fed mainly by natural springs. They're all over the damn place, if you know where to look." Haruka nodded, and eased her feet in again. There was another silence, and Naruto sighed. He suddenly wished for another distraction, another prank to come to mind, but every idea that came to him was useless. "I really hate the quiet," his lips began, and Makoto seemed to nod with him. "Part of the whole "I suck at school" thing was because I was - okay, AM - a bit of a class clown. It was just easier to, you know, have people laugh at me than it was to think about what they were thinking. People are so damn hard to understand, you know?"

He looked up at the sky, his mind trying to make sense of something that wasn't the stars, but seemed just as far away and mysterious. "I never had no one to really look after me," he started. "The orphanage was a joke, and I ran away from there shortly after I could walk and speak my mind." He paused. "Four, I think." Beside him, Makoto inhaled sharply, and he glanced at her with a smile. "Seems young, doesn't it? But, geez, If I hadn't have done what I did, I either wouldn't be sitting here with you, or I'd be someone else entirely. Probably the first."

His hands gripped the edge of the fountain so tightly that he thought it would crumble. His feet shuffled closer to him, and he hated the fact that he had to look like a child. "I... I never thought that I was selfish. And then," he finished softly, "I met you."

"Naruto, I don't understand. Why has meeting Haruka and I made you selfish?" Naruto thanked which ever deity in the heavens actually liked him that Makoto seemed to enjoy touching him. Her hand on his shoulder was almost familiar by now, and it calmed him, steadied him. His insides were swimming around inside of him, twisting and pulling parts of him all over the place, and all he wanted to do was to run away, or to find something to kick the crap of. Every fiber of his being seemed to shy away from explaining. But, he wasn't a coward. He would finish what he started, then figure out things from there. It'd always worked for him before.

"I'm a ninja, see." Behind him now, Haruka snickered. He turned, and found that she was shin deep in the fountain, holding her skirt away from the water with one hand while the other was raised as a balance. She rolled her eyes at him, and he glared at her anyway, before switching his attention back to Makoto. "I never really thought about it before, but this job is dangerous. I've nearly died on missions. Well," and he thought back to the fact that, in reality, he'd only done one mission that nearly killed him (as getting scratched by the Fire Lord's wife's cat, while painful, hadn't yet been life threatening), "okay, so there's only been one mission where I nearly died a few times, but I'm just beginning at this. Anyway, there's gonna be more after that. And, because I'm gonna succeed in all my missions, I'm going to make enemies. Enemies," he nearly whispered, "who could...could..." He punched his stone seat. "Dammit. I wish I could speak what I mean."

"Toppu was a mercenary." Naruto glanced at her, and she was staring off into the alcove of trees, away from Haruka, and away from him. "So, I knew that he would be gone from us. I just didn't know that it would be for most of Haruka's life. For most of mine." She sighed heavily. "I didn't want to talk about it before, Naruto, but Toppu died because of an ambush. His troop, a band of mercenaries made first of the men of our village, had grown in reputation and strength until they could no longer travel between villages without fanfare and word of mouth. My husband," and she paused, her voice cracking from emotion. "My husband was the leader of that group in everything but title. I told you before how he could talk to people and just convince them of things, even despite their own doubts and fears. I suppose that was his downfall."

Naruto couldn't interrupt her even though he was brimming with questions, because on Makoto's face was the look of exhaustion, like she had been walking for months straight and hadn't collapsed only because one foot kept placing itself in front of the other. Words dropped from Makoto, some louder than others, some so muted even the Fox couldn't hear it.

The scene was set. His grandfather's troop had been hired for a fairly risky mission in the Land of the Rain, where there were so few ninja that they actually hired non-ninja to do C and B-rank missions for them. There had been a siege by a group of rebels bent on displacing the Rain Daimyo, the equivalent of the Fire Lord, to "fix" the government. The rebels numbered over a hundred, with mercenaries of their own, and rumors of ninja placed in their ranks. They'd sequestered themselves in the thick, alien forests of the Rain, where they lived for months by raiding nearby civilian towns for supplies.

Makoto admitted that she didn't know the specifics of how it played out, but it was less of a battle than a small war. For months, Toppu's group, which numbered between seventy and fifty, survived in foreign territory, living off the land and through dozens of crippling battles. Slowly, their numbers dwindled, and their supplies were cut off by the twisting climate, sickness already consuming his men where the battles failed.

The final battle of the conflict was still talked about in awed whispers in the back rooms of smoky taverns, but Makoto didn't know where the stories came from. The few survivors of the battle refused to mention it. A few she had met trembled at the mention of it. All of the survivors had one thing in common.

They were Toppu's men.

None of them could look Makoto in the eye, not one of them could tell her what really happened. It was the boy he'd taken as an apprentice, she said, who told her that Toppu was dead. He had been the one to give Makoto one of the few relics of her husband she had left.

She had dug in her pack, rooting at the bottom, and finally pulling out a large bundle with effort. Dozens of letters, yellow with age, torn and ripped from wear and tear, were wrapped in twine and ribbons. He could see a few scraps of torn fabric in between letters, while small, jingling noises could be heard inside some of the envelopes. Makoto opened one of these reverently, her hands nearly shaking as she lifted out a long silver chain, with an odd medallion at the center of it.

It was a stylized "M", and Naruto felt, for an instant, a prickling on the back of his neck. There was something important here that he was missing. Makoto gently placed the necklace in his hands, and he handled it like it was going to break any moment, though his fingers could feel the weight of the chain, and the solid nature of the silver. Despite the fact that it had to cost a lot of money, it was worth more than all the money in all the Lands combined. It had been his grandfather's.

"My husband died for what he believed in." She concluded.

"For the mercenary mission?" Naruto asked, confused.

"No, for his men." She smiled, her bangs almost covering her eyes as her head drooped. "He died for them, and in spite of them. After so long, there was dissension among the survivors. Perhaps it was madness. They were out of food, out of time, out of hope, out of everything that keeps a man alive. No one will tell me who it was, but one of Toppu's own men sold information to the enemy."

She sat back, leaning so far that Naruto thought she was going to fall into the water. As if on that thought, Haruka stepped out of the fountain, shaking her legs off one after the other, and finding a scrap of clothing - he recognized it as the tunic she was wearing when he met her - dried them off. She sat barefoot next to her mother.

"So," Haruka picked up, after the moment stretched on, "Toppu was led into a trap with the rest of his men. He died, they lived, and there was no rebel left alive after that. I don't know what happened." Her expression was distant, "I'm not sure I want to know, actually. My father, you see, became a legend. Though long dead, there still came challengers, gangs, and ruffians to come to take the "legend" of his power from him. Perhaps they thought he was faking his own death, or perhaps they just came for revenge. Either way, our village suffered because of my father." She glanced at her mother, who was looking away from her, and then to Naruto. "I can't bring myself to hate him, but have you ever been in a situation where someone you love does something very wrong to you?"

Naruto's heart flew out of his chest and imbedded itself into the wall of a nearby building. "Yes." He whispered. "But, how do I... What should I feel?" His gazed fastened itself on his Aunt.

Haruka's gaze was far off, but her jaw was set firmly, something between determination and simple resignation on her features. "He didn't mean to die. I know that. Hell, he was a warrior - in battle was the way he wanted to go, but there still seems to be loose ends in his life. He died, Naruto, when I was barely old enough to recognize what it would be like to lose him. Part of me feels like I should love him, and that part of me does. I have scattered memories - thoughts, images, sensations - that almost seem alien. He sent letters," and she glanced at her mother's pack, where the bundle of letters was currently resting in view, "and I know of him from them. But, in words, actions, and memory, he was three different people."

She breathed in. "When we lose the ones we love, we want to blame someone. We want to get angry. We want revenge, closure." I suppose, and she looked back at Naruto, "that a Ninja would know this better than any of us. This whole village is based on battle, on a fight. It's just a question of what it fights for. Do you want to conquer? To defend? To make a name for yourself despite the odds? It's the reasons, the whys and hows and the situation behind it all, that can really drive a person mad. _If_ my father had been something other than a mercenary, he might've been alive when I was growing up. _If _Arashi hadn't become a ninja, perhaps he would've stayed with us. _If _Kichiro hadn't have left that night..." She bent as if struck, and Naruto could only breath as she collected herself. He couldn't interrupt, because at that moment, it was as if she was unfurling his own thoughts for the world to see.

"I believe that my father lived a good life. He had a wife he loved, children he protected and provided for, and a job that he was born to do. He had friends, comrades, and fans, people who looked up to him and pledged their loyalties and lives to him. Though that's not always the sign of a "good" man, that's the sign of a "great" man. I could look at the situation a thousand ways, but I still know nothing about the true nature of the fight. I only know _of_ the enemy, but unless I could talk to one of the survivors, I really wouldn't know anything. Toppu had a job to do, and as a mercenary, his last acts fulfilled his contract. As a man, his last acts protected the ones he valued. There was no dishonor in his actions."

She sighed heavily. "It really might've been the best way for him to die."

Makoto's hand clenched on the stone in an oddly familiar gesture to Naruto. "I... I can't speak of Toppu anymore. Not in this context." Haruka nodded, her jaw still stiff as her mother continued. "But, you can tell, Naruto, that Haruka and I are not alien to the dangers of being by the ones we love. Our village was remote, hidden by stone and set past miles of dizzying grassland. Still, danger found us because of Toppu, and later, because of Arashi. Who, by the way, tried to give us your same spiel when he first came back. He tried to say that the visit would be a one time thing. He said that he had to leave us in order to protect us. I had to convince him otherwise."

"With a frying pan." Haruka snickered.

"Do I...?" He trailed off. "No, never mind. Not gonna ask."

Naruto's mind still whirled around every word she spoke, every line clammoring for attention as he realized that there were still a thousand unanswered questions. About Haruka and Makoto, about Toppu, and about the mythical figure of his own father. He didn't know why the Yondaime chose him to be a demon vessel, and he couldn't speculate because Haruka was right - he _didn't_ know about the battle. Hell, he hadn't known jack about the _kyuubi _until a few months ago. Shinobi, he rationalized, (unfamiliar as the act was), were information gatherers just as much as they were warriors who acted on that knowledge.

He was a shinobi. He was currently lacking knowledge. There was no damn way in all of Konoha that he wasn't going to fix that as soon as he could.

"You're tired," he said, and he was just surprised as Makoto and Haruka that he was the first to break the silence. "All the inns and hotels around here are closed by now. I'm not even sure that they'd serve refugees." He smiled sadly. "Despite how beautiful you both look, you still look like foreigners, you know? Anyway," he continued, already standing up and flexing, "we're goin' back to my place."

"Naruto!" Makoto exclaimed, using one hand to push herself upwards. The genin could tell she was exhausted by the way that she leaned forward, her body constantly shifting to try to find some way that didn't ache. Haruka only glanced up at him, catching his gaze and challenging it for only a moment before she nodded almost imperceptibly. She tucked Toppu's letters in Makoto's bag with what could almost be tenderness, before sealing the complicated formation of waterproof pouches and leather layers. He frowned. He wasn't going to allow her to take up that burden again. Before she could even motion to pick the sack up, a pair of hands intercepted her. Then another. And another.

She glanced up, her eyes wide and her mouth gaping as she took in the small, half-dozen gathering of Naruto clones around her. One had already donned the pack, while another packed the other bag, and the other ran ahead as a scout (which had long been a force of habit for him). She blinked once. Then, again. Finally, she shook her head rapidly and swallowed. "That would be, Naruto-kun, the forbidden technique you learned from that scroll?"

Most of the Narutos nodded, a few crossing their arms, and others vocalizing their answer. The original glanced at a few of them, then answered. "Yep! One of the hardest hours of my life."

"...It just took you an hour?" Makoto wondered aloud. She stopped herself, then laughed. It wasn't like her half-hysterical laughter from the early afternoon, but a short, beautiful snort. "Arashi's child." She didn't speak after that, as if that explained everything about Naruto from the tips of his hair to the hems of his orange sweat pants.

"Let's go home." Naruto grinned. "Damn, I've always wanted to say that to someone." He couldn't help but turn his head back to watch them. He tried desperately to remember everything about them, everything about this incredibly long day and night.

He hoped that whatever didn't hate him up the heavens let this night last a little longer. He hoped that this day wasn't just a dream, or some horrible genjutsu that he forgot he encountered. He hoped that, tomorrow, he would wake up and his family would still be there.

He hoped, and the change felt good.

* * *

If anyone ever tells you that writing a story gets easier the further in you get, they're _lying_. I feel like I've rewritten it three times, and it still seems like gibberish. If you get anything redeeming from this chapter, let me know because I'll be _very_ curious to find out what it is. 

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter in some way. I have big, non-angsty plans for the next chapter. Wonderful, horrible plans. Thanks for all the reviews and page hits so far - I have a feeling that with this chapter, I'll break 5K page views. That pretty much blows my mind.

Oh! Fun facts! I updated the first chapter with the story warnings and set up. For the lazy, this is set before the Chuunin Exams arc, right after the Wave Country Arc. It relies on a suspension of belief on the length of time between the two. Also, hopefully, this cleared up some things about Toppu.

As always, I'm paranoid about my OCs. If they breech any unknown rules of conduct, drop me a line. Thanks again!


	7. Food for Thought

Chapter 7

Naruto had long known that his apartment wasn't the best in Konoha. It wasn't the worst in Konoha, though, and that's what counted. Well, to him at least. When he first ran away from the orphanage, he'd lived on the street for a few weeks. Most of the time, he'd be caught again by ANBU in a matter of hours, then deposited in one foster home after another. The most he lasted in one of those, however, had been seven hours and fifteen minutes. After that, his caretaker finally got free of her ropes and reported to the Hokage, but by that time, Naruto was already long gone, back to the deep set, hidden archway he'd taken as a home.

The Hokage had eventually gotten the hint that Naruto didn't want to be in the orphanage (which was true), didn't want to be in foster care (which was also true), and just preferred to be on his own (which was a filthy, dirty lie that Naruto was sure everyone knew). It was with that realization that the Hokage arranged for this apartment, which was at the time the only one which would accept him. It was a godsend.

For a one room apartment, it was actually rather large. His full-size bed was in one corner of the room, while a large table, well-worn and with a glued-on leg, sat in the center, last seen covered in a mound of paperwork, ramen cups, and odd articles of clothing a foot deep. A small partition separated the cooking space from the living area. It didn't quite qualify as a _real _ kitchen because it only had a two-burner range and an oven that Naruto had, on occasion, used to toast clothing in when the building's dryer broke. The fridge was, quite possibly, an artifact from the Shodaime, and he was almost positive that the green, furry growth in the vegetable crisper predated even Konoha. The small bathroom was the most luxurious part of the entire apartment, a bit larger than his bed, with a large bathtub that had a fairly regular supply of hot water.

There were small knick knacks that were spread throughout the apartment. Beside his bed, there was a bookshelf with a few scattered training manuals, a potted plant, and a layer of dust that had three different layers of shinobi symbols on it. These included "clean?", "tomorrow", and "what color was this originally?", with the small long-hand written calender that had "Ramen with Iruka-sensei!" circled twice. A few pictures of Iruka were framed and deposited in odd corners, while one of Sasuke, Sakura-chan, and Kakashi-sensei was taped to the fridge. It had been taken shortly after Kakashi had passed them, months ago. There was even a candid shot of the Sandaime, one that the ANBU hadn't caught and confiscated for "security purposes". Sarutobi sat at the counter of Ichiraku, the dignified "Professor" of Konoha forever immortalized with noodles hanging out past his chin, mouth half-open in the midst of a stern lecture. Naruto had framed it and propped it up against the window sill that had the single best view of the Hokage Memorial in Konoha. At dusk, the Fourth's face looked golden, and on occasion, Naruto could see what could almost be lights near the Nidaime's face.

He had a small work desk against the partition to the kitchen where he regularly polished his well-worn, second-hand kunai and shuriken. The best part about missions was that, at the end of the battle, everyone seemed to lose count of who threw how many of which weapon, and Naruto found that, quite remarkably, a lot of his equipment was now better than when he bought it. On the desk, there were a few half-empty bottles of polish, some spare leather to bind the handles of his kunai with, and a few sharpening stones that never seemed to do the job right.

Among the other odds and ends in his apartment were his mission supplies, which took up the corner next to his door, his small closet full of t-shirts, shorts, and a few spare sets of shinobi gear that didn't quite fit him right anymore, and, most noticeably at that moment, a high-pitched, constantly ringing alarm clock.

Naruto cursed, and found that the sound was muffled. He tried to crack open his eyes, but only one chose to respond while the other was coated with something like sand. Using all his shinobi willpower and restraint, he resisted bashing the infernal, hell-born device with his fist. Instead, he dug beside him for the small, secret stash of kunai he kept for emergencies (and for the alarm clock, of which he'd gone through nine since making genin).

His mind registered first the fact that he couldn't find any kunai. He looked around, and realized he wasn't on his bed. Instead of being softly caressed by the boundless comfort of his well-worn, patch-covered mattress, he was laying off to the side of it, wrapped in his sleeping bag and on top of the bed roll that he used on missions. The fact that the alarm was still ringing seemed like a secondary consideration to the fact that Naruto had finally glanced around.

It didn't look like his house.

He stumbled up, only getting caught in the bag three times before gaining enough feeling in his fingers to unzip it enough for him to roll out. He swayed uneasily on the floor, half-expecting it to sweep out under him. He ran into the alarm clock with one foot, "accidentally" flinging it into the wall. It rang a few more times, persistent to the end, before trailing off in the middle of one, as if it finally got the point.

Part of him glanced towards the bed, and he felt nothing short of absolute longing to go there and be with his one true love. The other part of him, the part that usually kept him alive on missions, noticed that the bed was _made_. He saw the edges of sheets thought long since missing in the Great Crack Beyond the Mattress peaking out of a comforter that was smoothly spread over the top of the bed. Incredulous, he stumbled over, swearing twice as his toes got caught on the flat, level ground. That alone gave him pause, because while the accumulated mess that had served as a carpet for him for more than half his life was, at points, level, it was never smooth.

He glanced down, and were it not for the fact that his jaw felt like it'd been soldered on, he would've screamed. As it was, the attempt came out as "Grmmmgh.". Naruto leaned against the edge of the bed, astonishment slowly pumping enough adrenaline into his system to allow his eyes to open the entire way.

He had hard wood floors.

He found himself frozen completely for a moment, his eyes only seeming to focus on the unnatural gleam and sparkle of the yellow wood. He glanced up just an inch, but an inch was more than he needed for his eyes to focus on the strange, alien-looking table in the center of his apartment.

It was dark brown, and it seemed to _audibly_ shine in a way he hadn't seen since the last time Maito Gai did his "nice guy" pose. It had the same eerie sheen as kunai or shuriken when they were coming straight at him. It wasn't ever a good sign. Gone was the foot deep, familiar mound. Instead, there were straight, orderly piles of papers, envelopes, and, as his feet subconsciously drew him closer, he saw a basket of what could only be wax fruit, because no fruit he'd ever seen had such a polished shine to it.

Everything was clean.

He was_ clearly _in the wrong house. Then again, he reasoned, that was his table, and those had been his pattern of sheets on the bed. It was his apartment, but it was _clean_. It had to be an alternate dimension. Any moment now, it would turn out that he was the only ninja in Konoha, because the rest of the people he knew were pirates in this dimension. Somehow, the idea of Kakashi wearing an eye patch, a high collared jacket covering his face, with a rapier at his side seemed to fit way too easily. The rest of the scene came together easily. Sakura might have pretended to be a boy, except that everyone saw her pink hair and just humored her. Sasuke would be a broody, bad-tempered son of a (and he searched for an equivalent to the big clans in Konoha) Navy captain, but ran away with pirates anyway.

"But, how can I be a pirate?," he found his mouth mumbling while his mind strained to catch up, "I have two legs and I don't have a parrot."

"That," came a female voice, and Naruto jolted to a fully conscious state immediately in response to it, "was quite possibly the strangest thing I've ever heard someone say, even when considering that you're only now getting awake." He saw Makoto snicker behind the back of her hand as she stepped out from behind the kitchen partition.

It was like seeing her for the first time all over again.

She was wearing a freshly laundered, plain blue dress with a white apron over it. Naruto was _sure_ he'd seen the apron somewhere before. A few stunned seconds later, he realized that he'd been using as a curtain for the minuscule window in the kitchen. She'd obviously slept and bathed, because gone were most of the weary, dark circles under her eyes, and her skin was left a gold color, not brown, but obviously sun worn. Her hair was actually even on both sides, reaching just under her ears, and he wondered when she'd found time to cut it. Her eyes were still the same blue he dreamed about for years. She had a smile on her face, and Naruto's heart stopped beating.

It was a smile meant for him.

"It... wasn't a dream?" he managed, half-breathless, tongue fumbling and teeth doing nothing but getting in the way. It felt like he'd been asleep for years, and that still didn't seem to be enough.

"No, Naruto-kun, I'm quite sure that it _was_ a dream. There aren't any seas around here for pirates. None that I've seen, anyway." She shook her head, and Naruto could see that, if it weren't for the fact that it was still damp, it might have spiked.

"I mean, you're here." He paused. "Wow." He couldn't help but feel the greatest grin of his life sneak onto his face. It was even better than the time that he won the 10,000th customer contest at Ichiraku's. It was more powerful than when Iruka gave him his hitai-ite. Hell, it was larger than the time he finally found hair dye that would work on (what was left of) Sarutobi's hair, and the Sandaime had to wear his pointy hat for a week straight to hide the green.

Finally awake, Naruto glanced around, trying to figure out what else was different around his house. The workbench now looked crowded with dozens and dozens of kunai and shuriken, split between two buckets. His bookshelf was dusted, and apparently was originally bright blue, which was quite surprising. The curtains even looked different - they really _were_ yellow, and not just from the dust. The windows sparkled, the floor shimmered, and there was a sweet, lingering smell he couldn't immediately name in the air. Normally, he tried to completely ignore his sense of smell and taste when in his apartment. "It's clean," he murmured, and Makoto behind him laughed. He glanced towards her. "How did I get here? Seriously, I don't remember anything after the park conversation."

Makoto looked surprised. "Well, your "clones", I believe, picked Haruka and I up, shouldered our packs, and scared half the life out of me. Naruto, I don't care if ninja use the roof tops of Konohagakure as their own highways. I, for one, was _never_ meant to travel airborne." She shook her head. "Haruka enjoyed it, I think. She might ask you for a ride, one of these days. But, you carried us here, and gave us a brief tour, and told us to make ourselves at home." Her smile was the sort to pulled dimples to her cheeks. "And, you pretty much pulled out some of the things from your mission things and collapsed on the floor. You slept for," she paused, "oh, a good eight hours."

"...eight?" Naruto whimpered. The last time he only slept eight hours had been when he'd had to get a wisdom tooth pulled, and they put him in the hospital because the damn thing grew back. The nurses there refused to let him sleep his usual twelve to fourteen. He glanced around, and noticed that the sky was still dark outside the windows. "You mean," and his lips tried to mouth the unfamiliar sentence, "I'm up before _sunrise?"_

His grandmother blinked, then raised her hand to rest on her lips. "Oh, so I take it that's unusual for you? But then, why was your alarm clock set for that time?"

He had to think about that for a moment, but finally came up with an answer. "Ah, crap. I guess it's because it's a wind up clock. I remembered that Kakashi-sensei said he was training us today at 4." At her blank look, he continued. "He's always late, so setting the clock for six and showing up at seven is a bit optimistic. But, because it's a wind-up clock, it just rang at the first "six" it encountered. Guess I was too exhausted to think about that."

Makoto nodded, apparently satisfied with the explanation. "You asked about how miraculously clean this apartment became? I'm afraid that was my doing. You were so kind to us all day, and even before I knew for certain that you were Arashi's son, I felt the need to repay you. I wondered all through the night about how to do just that, and I must admit that it bothered me. I had no idea what I, a simple housewife, could do to help a ninja." She smirked. "Then I came here."

Naruto bowed his head and hunched his shoulders. "Eh, yeah. Well, I guess I see that." He looked around. "It looks better now. I mean, I kinda miss the way the carpet used to crunch when you walked on it...". Makoto made a noise of disapproval. "...but I guess it'll be nice to walk around barefoot." He finished quickly, glancing up to watch Makoto's eyes. At that moment, she somehow looked needy, as if _she_ were the one starved for affection and now him. "I really don't know how you did this." He paused. "You _did _sleep last night and all, right? You can't do bunshins or nothing, because you're not a ninja, so are you sure you didn't hire a cleaning squad or something? Geez, where's Haruka anyway? Hey!" he started, nose crinkling, "what's that smell, anyway?"

Makoto's smirk turned into a wry laugh. "Yes, I slept. I just wake up rather early. There's a rather large time difference between when I woke up back home and when this village wakes up. It was the same for me even in the caravan. Yes, I'm not a ninja, no I didn't hire a ninja cleaning squad." She paused. "Wait, those actually exist?" Her eyebrows raised further at Nartuo's enthusiastic nod. "Interesting. Haruka's out in the village, looking for work. I actually wanted to speak with you about that. Finally, that smell," and it was her turn to look sheepish, "is breakfast. I wasn't sure what kind of meal you preferred, but I decided to make Western-style, because it's what I'm most proficient with." She turned her head for a moment, and spared him a small, almost sickly smile. "I'm afraid that I have to go check on it. It might be ready, actually. Please, wait here."

Before Naruto could even open his mouth, she shifted awkwardly, and Naruto hadn't even realized that they'd seated themselves across from each other at the eerily clean kitchen table until she moved away from it. He saw, with no small amount of shock, that she'd somehow rigged what looked to be an actual curtain as a partition between the kitchen and his living area. He looked around again, trying to figure out not so much his surroundings, but what would come of them.

It wasn't that the clean was unwelcome. Hell, he hadn't been lying when he said that he could walk barefoot now and not expect to be stabbed by weapons, food items, and long forgotten layers of crusty clothes so old that they actually resented him. It was a complete surprise to look out the window and not see "Clean your windows!" and "get better blinds!" in haphazard, shinobi symbols, probably written by the Creepy Mask Guys (which he thought really did sound better than "ANBU") who used to watch him, and probably still did. The fact that his apartment didn't smell like it could be used as a harmful inhalant to deter enemy invasions was a new, exciting concept that most of his senses completely celebrated. Hell, if he concentrated hard enough, he could feel the Fox inside of him writhing around in approval, which differed from his normal "writhing around in anger" in that he was churning in a different direction.

What was making the genin tense was the fact that Makoto's _act_ of cleaning meant something, and he wasn't sure what it was. She said that she was a housewife, and he figured that any woman who spent most of her life tending her own house couldn't take more than two steps into his without feeling the almost hypnotic compulsion to scrub it spotless and kill all invaders. What was troubling was the idea that if his grandfather was away as a mercenary half as much as Naruto was away from being a ninja, Makoto really _had _been the ruler of her own house. Haruka seemed to follow with whatever Makoto said, and the two obviously could live together if Haruka hadn't left her mother, despite being in her twenties. The problem with that revelation was the fact that Naruto had been on his own for the last eight years (though, really, it'd been twelve), and he was used to running things his way.

He glanced around at the clean table, at the workbench scattered around with more weapons than he used in five ninja battles, the closet door that actually could _shut_, the glistening windows and the organized bookshelf. In less than eight hours, as she had obviously slept a bit less than Naruto had, being awake before him, she had scrubbed, peeled, hammered, and chiseled away all the dirt and grime he'd come to live with. On top of that, she was in the kitchen, making breakfast.

He could live like this. The problem was that he didn't want to.

Naruto didn't know much about grandmothers. Hell, he didn't know much about old people in general. The huge discrepancy between Makoto's estimated age and her real age showed just how unused to them he was. Even though Sarutobi had to be the oldest ninja in the village, possibly the oldest one _in_ the village, Naruto knew that the Hokage couldn't be held in the same regard as a houswife. With that having been stated, Naruto had no idea what it was that grandmothers were supposed to do. He had a feeling, though, that they shouldn't have to do as much work as Makoto obviously did in a single night.

From reading, he knew that they sat in rocking chairs and told their grandchildren stories. Naruto didn't mind the "stories" aspect of it, because he had so many questions about her, about Toppu, and about Arashi that he felt like he would burst every time one thought gave birth to twins. He had no idea where he'd find a rocking chair, though, and the idea of Makoto, who seemed almost fidgety this morning, doing nothing but sitting seemed wrong. Grandmothers were also supposed to knit a lot, gossip over fences, and make houses out of candy and then eat children, and he somehow couldn't see Makoto's long, spindly fingers threaded with yarn, and couldn't imagine her abiding gossip. He didn't want to think about the last one too hard because it made his brain hurt.

Konohamaru was a horrible, mean-spirited brat. He was ill-mannered, ill-tempered, and it seemed that all he ever wanted was the attention of everyone in a ten foot radius of him. Naruto was incredibly glad he was_ nothing_ like that. The blonde couldn't use Konohamaru as an example of how to act because, despite being part of the only grandparent/child set Naruto knew, the kyuubi-vessel somehow knew that whatever their relationship was, it wasn't typical.

Naruto had no example of how a grandparent was supposed to act, no example of how a grandchild was supposed to act, and had absolutely no prior experience at all with parents. Haruka seemed like someone he could get along with, so "Aunt" just seemed like a superfluous prefix, like "Honorable Hokage Sarutobi", where the first two parts just fell away in conversation with him. But, with Makoto, he _didn't_ want to think of her as anything but a grandmother, and he suddenly felt awkward because honestly, he didn't even know what to call her anymore. Calling her "Makoto" seemed like he was talking to a stranger, and "Grandmother" seemed so formal, and completely unlike him.

The only option before him was winging it

In one way or another, he'd made it up on his way his entire life. It wasn't as if he'd had a plan when he left the orphanage, but he found an archway and a discarded box, and the two together worked well as "Home". He didn't have any idea where to go from there, but every time the ANBU captured him, and every time he came back, he learned a bit more about how to evade them, how to make his time stretch a bit more. Eventually, he proved his point, got his apartment, and achieved his goal. The first real lesson he learned about winging it was to actually learn a lesson from winging it. He learned to avoid certain pathways because ANBU were always staked there. He learned that showering occasionally really_ did _make him less noticeable. He learned that, most importantly, he was going to screw up, but that it was really the ability to screw up in a new, unexpected way that eventually accomplished his goal.

School was the same way. Before Iruka, and even after, he learned that what was on the syllabus or what was in the book was probably not even close to what he'd be called on about in class, so he'd have to stretch out what he learned. Sometimes he got lucky and made a connection that surprised the entire class. Unfortunately, that only made the teachers look for more impressive ways to cut him down. From that, he learned the lesson that, no matter how good he was in one fight, there was no guarantee he'd win the next one. It was either be prepared for the fight, or be prepared to lose. Of course, knowing what the moral was and actually going through with it were two separate challenges, and following that mantra at the academy always seemed fairly fruitless. It did come in handy in fights, though.

Training with Sasuke had really drilled in the last real rule of improvisation. The dark-haired bastard had been dominating a quick sparing match, the two boys going all out in a spar that was only loosely watched by Kakashi-sensei. Sakura had been on the sidelines, rooting for Sasuke, and Naruto had been completely out of options.

The objective of the match had been simple, merely to push the opponent out of a medium-sized ring. It limited Naruto's techniques quite a bit because if even _one_ of his Bunshins stepped out of bounds, he lost. Meanwhile, Sasuke had better aerial skills than he did even without using the Sharinghan, and Naruto was being pummeled by that damn fireball jutsu of the Uchiha's, trying to duck away from the faster boy in a ring without any ground cover.

Naruto knew for a fact that his ninjitsu was incredibly limited, his genjutsu bordered on complete failure, and his taijutsu was a complete mess. Usually, his good strength, otherworldly endurance, and limitless chakra capacity made up for his abysmal speed, agility, and chakra control. The rules of this match were completely against him, but the reward was too steep to loss for.

A free week of Ichiraku's ramen for the entire team on whoever lost.

The third rule of winging it really was the most important to him and was, on a day-to-day basis, the only one he remembered consistently. When it came to something precious to Naruto, whether it was a precious person, a precious belief, or a precious, steaming, hot bowl of Ichiraku ramen, it was better to risk it all than do nothing.

Naruto quickly saw a pattern in Sasuke's attacks. The Uchiha would scour the area with a fire jutsu, forcing Naruto to take to the air, where Sasuke would quickly kick the crap out of him with aerial taijutsu. The next time that Sasuke attacked, however, Naruto didn't dodge the jutsu, instead using a pile of bunshins to take the blast for him. They didn't block the flames very well because they did dissipate with one good hit, but the smoke was the real goal, and as the clones dissipated, Sasuke quickly leaped forward to push the crouching blonde out of the ring.

Just as Sasuke started with the predictable scathing remarks about Naruto's lack of skill, the _real_ Naruto attacked from behind, using Sasuke's own momentum to push him over the crouching clone, and out of the ring. While Sasuke had been in midair, the real Naruto had used the smoke from his dissolving clones as cover, rolling under the dark-haired boy and preparing his final move.

Ramen hadn't ever tasted so sweet.

Naruto rubbed his chin as he considered how to apply these to Makoto and Haruka. He'd have to learn from his mistakes, learn about _why_ those mistakes happened, and then move on before he made that same mistake again. It seemed so very simple, but Naruto already knew better.

"Here," Makoto interrupted, and Naruto blinked as she set a mug of something steaming in front of him, "you look to still be half-asleep." There was a small smile on her face, but Naruto saw that her eyes almost looked red. He wondered if she had been crying in the kitchen, and wondered further at how in the world he had missed it. He frowned, one fang peeking over his lip absently.

"You didn't need to do that," he began, and Makoto waved her hands in front of her.

"No, no! I wanted to." She glanced around, and Naruto really didn't know what she was looking for. Then, he realized that it wasn't what she was looking _for_, but what she was looking _away_ from. Him.

His hands reached for the mug in front of him reflexively, because he knew that if he didn't have anything in them they would clench. In one swift motion, he gulped down half the mug of the strange, pungent drink.

He quickly regretted it.

"It's called coffee." she began, and Naruto could tell that she was resisting laughter. He couldn't tell if that was nice of her, or very mean-spirited. "It's popular where I'm from, but it was rather hard to find here." Naruto's cheeks puffed out as he contemplated spitting the foul, evil liquid back into the mug. He took one more look at Makoto's almost vulnerable expression, and swallowed. At once, his eyelids shot open of their own accord. He felt like someone kicked in his gut, and despite himself, he sat up straighter.

"No, I know what coffee is. I used to have it in the Hokage's tower when I was a kid. Scared the hell out of the older ninja. The "rare" part is kinda because I got it banned for a while. Long story, though. What I meant was "What the hell was in that?"." He clarified. He wondered if his eyelids were ever going to close, and tried to figure out if his hand was shaking, or if his foot was vibrating the table.

"Half a mug of milk, five scoops of sugar, and a splash of coffee." Her smile could've been called evil by some, but at that moment, Naruto felt nothing but awe for her. He chugged the rest of the mug. "Haruka won't take it any other way, and I needed to brew up half a pot just to get her out the door this morning to help me shop."

He frowned. "Wait, shopping? I didn't have any coffee last night, and I don't have anything to make breakfast with either..." His head shot up, and he glared her at accusingly. "You spent money on me, didn't you? You didn't have to do th-"

"No,", she interrupted, holding up one hand to forestall his speech. Reflexively, he shut up. He hated how the civilian "Wait" gesture synced up with the shinobi "Shut up - danger!" sign, and decided that he was going to change one of the two when he became Hokage, just to make things easier. "I really did have to. Last night, you paid for our food, and letting us stay in this apartment saved us the cost of a hotel room." She glanced at him. "I did notice that there were a few twenty-four hour hotels about here, and they seemed rather friendly towards us. You were lying last night, weren't you?"

Her sharp gaze cut right through him and sank all the way into the wall behind him. He gulped. "Well, I mean, not really. It's not like I really knew..." He glanced around, sincerely hoping for a ninja to miss a step and fall through his roof. Any distraction would be very welcomed by him. "Er, hell. I just wanted you to be where I knew you'd be safe."

"Safe?" Makoto murmured to herself, her expression thoughtful. "Safe from what?"

He stared out the window. The clouds were just starting to turn pink, and most of the Hokage's Monument was still in shadow, with only the pointy noses of the Nidaime and Shodaime catching illumination. "I'm not liked around here. It's not something I did, really. I mean, if it were just the pranks, I'd understand it all, except it's not." His fang bit into his lip, and he didn't realize that his voice had gotten lower until Makoto slid close to him. "The villagers here...they hate me. One day, they won't, you know? I'll become Hokage, and I'll be respected. Acknowledged." He paused, and had to start again quickly because he knew that if he let that sentence drop there would be a silence that would last for days, or worse, questions that he couldn't answer. "But, right now they stare at me, and whisper under their breath, and just...just..." He looked up sharply.

Makoto had an actual handkerchief twisted in one hand, and was raising up Naruto's chin with the other. With deliberate slowness, she dabbed at a small trail of blood that Naruto hadn't even noticed. Her fingers were long, and rough from wear. Despite the blisters, despite the calluses, and despite the roughly cut (or chewed) fingernails, her touch was soft and light on his skin, barely pressing on it. He couldn't stop from staring at her, not with the way she was holding him, and he tried to figure out why her lips were pressed into a thin line and why her eyebrows were furrowed when, at the same time, her eyes towards him were soft.

"Here," she said, and brought his hand to the handkerchief (he noted that it had embroidered red flowers at the edges), "keep that still while I get breakfast. It'll burn if I'm not quick."

She stood up, striding out to the kitchen with long steps. Naruto, despite himself, drew the linen back. It was only a tiny amount of blood. Honestly, it was next to nothing for a regular shinobi, let alone one with his accelerated healing powers. He'd never particularly thought about his fangs, or the whisker markings that were set into his skin like incisions that never bled, but never healed. Now, all he could think about was what _she_ thought about them.

The genin couldn't help but wonder at how he'd been singled out as a child because of his markings and his teeth when, at the very same time, any given Inuzuka could prance around with tattoos and claws and not get more than a second glance. Despite the fact that any Akimichi ninja was built like a bank vault and covered in red, spiral tattoos (that he always wanted to have, too) they were known as some of Konoha's nicest people, and none of their markings (or Choji's strange hat) ever were pointed out in the street. He wondered what his life would've been like if he didn't have any visible markings of the Kyuubi on him. Somehow, he didn't think it would be that different from the life he led now.

"Eat," Makoto ordered, and he followed the clang of plates being set down on the table. Plates, as in plural. Plural plates loaded with food. Naruto's eyes widened in shock, and he nearly dropped Makoto's cloth as he realized that it was more food than _he_ could eat.

His grandmother began pointing out dishes as she loaded his plate with mounds of each individual delicacy. There was a huge pyramid of thick sausages, a mountain of hash browns, a plate stacked high with pancakes (in blueberry, banana, _and_ chocolate chip), an endless supply of bacon, enough eggs to last him the rest of his life, cooked in grease in what Makoto called "dippy style", and a small serving of what Makoto called "scrapple", which was made of indeterminable ingredients but smelled fantastic. She sat out a huge bottle of maple syrup, another pot of coffee, and a glass of orange juice in less time than it took Naruto to wake up on a normal day.

She watched him, and Naruto didn't know why until he realized that his hands weren't moving. "Damn! I mean, thank you for the food!" With that, he sat to work. The eggs were covered in salt and pepper, and tasted fantastic. Makoto showed him how to use lightly buttered pieces of toast to scoop up the runny yolks. She dowsed the scrapple (which he internally dubbed "meat stuff") into maple syrup and proved that God _did_ exist, and his sole contribution to Naruto's life was scrapple, a fact which Naruto was completely okay with. He worked his way through the perfectly juicy sausages (which Makoto showed him could _also_ be dipped in pure sugar), lingered lovingly on the pancakes, watching as Makoto slathered huge tabs of butter between each plate-sized delight, and realized somewhere between the fourth egg and the third jam-covered english muffin that he couldn't get up.

He could swear that Makoto was smirking as she gathered up the plates. "That," he paused, and leaned back in his chair, feeling for once completely, utterly full to the point of discomfort, "was the most amazing meal I've ever had. Seriously!" he protested as he saw her snort, "it was even better than Ichiraku. You can't ever tell 'em I said that, by the way. Where in Hell did you learn to cook like that?" Despite himself, he stood, groaning as his stomach felt like lead. He stetched his joints, cracked his neck, and gathered a large armful of plates, trying to figure out if he could just roll himself to the kitchen instead of walking the whole way.

She looked thoughtful for a moment, cupping her chin. "Well, I suppose that I learned from watching and helping my grandmother and mother cook for all of us, when I was younger." Anticipating something, she smiled at Naruto. "I was the youngest girl in my family."

"Oh? You had siblings?" He leaned forward, trying to concentrate on balancing the dishes and walk at the same time. It was difficult, because most of his attention was sepnt on watching Makoto smile at him. "How many?"

"Eleven."

Naruto's plates fell to within a half inch of the ground before he caught them, a handful in his hands, but most in his mouth or on his head. He stood, ordered them again, and stared at Makoto. "...ELEVEN?" He winced, and half expected a chorus of "Rule Number Eight!" to ring out. "Are you kidding me? HOW?"

She laughed. "My mother had three daughters, then three sons. Her first husband died, and she remarried my father. He had five children from his previous marriage - all sons - and then I was born." She shook her head as she caught Naruto's dropped jaw. "Oh, it really wasn't that bad. My older sisters were all married and out of the house by the time that I could walk. My older brothers stayed longer, but eventually found wives, or work outside the town."

"Are they still around, too? Do I have some uncles and aunts...well, great-uncles and great-aunts around? What about cousins? Hey! What about your parents? Are they..." He realized he grabbed onto the wrong topic the minute he saw Makoto's face collapse. It was like someone jabbed a kunai into her gut, because at once all the air seemed to escape her, and the smile she had on her face was replaced by one of utter pain. "Crap. Okay, I didn't mean to bring it up. Really! You don't need to talk about it."

She walked to the kitchen, and Naruto followed her. "It's not your fault, Naruto. You couldn't have known. Maybe one day, I'll be able to talk about it, but I don't think this is the time." She sat her load of dishes into a sink Naruto only barely recognized as his (the last time he'd actually seen the bottom of his sink had been when he was nine, and he used all his plates as kunai targets). She turned around, and seemed surprised that Naruto had brought dishes as well, but cleared way for Naruto to set his dishes down, before turning on the faucet and squirting strange smelling liquid Naruto vaguely remembered as dish soap in with the steaming water.

"Will you help me dry these when I'm done with them?" She rolled up the sleeves of her dress past her elbows, glancing at the wall behind the sink instead of Naruto. "I wasn't sure where to put them, either. Where do you normally keep your dishes?"

"The sink." She did shoot him a look, one eyebrow cocked. He shrugged. "Hey, I'm being honest."

"Honesty." she stated. Naruto waited, and she didn't seem to want to finish her thought. Instead, she furiously scrubbed at one of Naruto's plates, attacking left over gobs of maple syrup with the intent to kill. When she handed him the first completely spotless, almost boiling hot plate, he didn't know where to put it. Finally, he shrugged, and walked up the wall, carefully crouching on the ceiling as he fought the highest cupboard's door open. From his angle, he could see a pack of crackers and two granola bars that were probably older than he was, half devoured by a caccoon of spider webs.

"Hey, could you spare a rag?" He glanced down, and saw Makoto staring up at him with wide eyes. He looked around, trying to see what was odd. He paused. "Oh, it's the ceiling thing, right? If it bugs you, I can stop." She mutely shook her head, and walked to one side, retrieving a cloth that she reached up to pass to him. "Thanks." He bunched up the crackers and the bar, reaching the back corners with ease, and tossed the whole mess into the trashcan, which was only fifteen feet away and hidden in a corner.

His grandmother made quick work of the dishes, while he found himself struggling to find places to put dishes he had no idea he owned. He vaguely remembered having a gravy boat serving as a planter somewhere, while he had no clue how he got five different sizes of bowls, or where to put them. After passing the last few sopping dishes up to Naruto, Makoto untied her apron and hung it on a row of small hooks Naruto swore he never saw before. Naruto leaped down from the ceiling, doing a quick somersault to land in an easy crouch in front of Makoto who, to her credit, only stifled a gasp and stepped back a few inches. Naruto grinned at her, and she shook her head with a short laugh. Naruto could hear he breathe something like "Boys." under her breath.

She cracked her knuckles, and led the way back into the living area, where she pulled out a chair and beckoned Naruto to do the same. "Thank you," she said, and the smile on her face was genuine. "I've always enjoyed working with someone, when it comes to small chores like that." She paused. "I've been meaning to speak with you about this, Naruto, but I've been putting it off. I don't believe that it's fair to either of us." She forced herself into something resembling the same regal posture Naruto saw the night before. He noted that this time, her hands seemed to shake, and her jaw almost seemed clenched. "Haruka and I, as you've noted, are refugees. Our village was sacked not a year ago, and my daughter and I are among the only survivors. My daughter and I have suffered our fair share of troubles, and I must admit that, in coming to Konoha, it was less about finding out about my son and more of finding a way to move on. Haruka and I," she started, and she leaned forward against the table, hands wringing nervously as she pleaded with Naruto, "we only want to find a life for ourselves. I mentioned earlier than Haruka is out looking for a job. That's true. I'm not sure what kind of jobs there are in Konoha, but we'll both do whatever we need to, and whatever we can. But, I've checked the math, and by what she and I have saved, it would put too much stress on her, on me, to afford even a hotel room on a regular basis. What I ask," she started, the words coming out more firmly than she herself intended them, because she glanced down again almost demurely, "no, 'ask' isn't the right word. What Haruka and I _beg_ of you is just to stay here a bit longer."

Naruto felt something weighing a thousand times more than his heart sink through his chest, beating against his ribs to the point of breaking them, and crushing his stomach so that he thought he would throw up. He watched his grandmother swallow, her chest nearly heaving as she struggled to keep her tone level.

"Haruka's willing to work two jobs, and I hope to pick up another soon. But, to live here, I'll gladly clean and cook, and-"

"_Absolutely not."_ He hadn't been aware of how icy his tone was until he saw her draw back as if slapped. He hadn't realized that he had leaned forward, his hands clenched around the table so tightly that his fingers left divots until he heard the wood creak beneath him. His fangs bit into his lip, and he actually meant it this time because the pain control the fury that had spread over him like a genjutsu. Naruto felt anger, a rage fueled by that same weight in his stomach, as if it was slowly dissolving like acid inside of him. "I will _not_ let you work yourself to death while staying here." He was snarling, and he didn't care. "You're _family_."

The word hung in the air like thick smoke between them, and Naruto felt his breathing even out. Makoto was still arched in the chair, frozen in motion. "Family," he continued, and it might have just been the blood that made the word taste bitter, "means that you _never_ have to beg. Never say that word in front of me again." He stopped, and he laughed, though it sounded like a choke. It might have been. "Please." He couldn't tell if Makoto only needed to breathe, or if she laughed-choked in return. "I was lying last night. You're right." He caught Makoto's gaze and refused to let his own waver, even though he felt like shaking. "There were motels, hotels you could've gone to. Konoha's not a bad place, really. You probably would've been served for the night, or more. But, I was selfish. I didn't want you," and he had to blink, he had to close his eyes for a moment, then a minute, before continuing, "I didn't want you to go. I still don't."

"I won't let you."

Makoto gasped, but he didn't allow himself that luxury because he was sure that if he took even a single breath, all the words he meant to say would escape. "I'm not going to lie to you. I'm not sure I have yet, but, if I have, I'm sorry. I'm just so _sick_ of lies, and deceit, and all the damn pretending."

There was a pause. "...and you're a ninja?"

He laughed, and it was caught between a bitter snort and a near-hysterical guffaw. "Yeah. Can't say I'm too good at that part of it." He risked a smile, and Makoto was crying. "Oh, _Hell_. I made you cry. Shit. I'm sorry."

She reached out to touch her own face, and had an expression of utter confusion for a moment. With a quick motion, she wiped away the few forming droplets in the corners of her eyes. She reached in her pocket for something, and Naruto didn't realize what it was until her eyes fell on his lip again. "Oh! Your handkerchief!" He glanced around, realizing that it'd dropped to the floor. He ducked down to get it, and stood up out of his chair, moving towards his grandmother.

She didn't flinch, and he realized at that very moment that he loved her.

He twisted the linen around until he found a clean area, dabbing gently at the wet tracks on her cheeks. "I'm sorry that I made you cry. Really. I just suck with people, you know? They hate me."

"Why?" One of her hands wrapped around his wrist, and he let her dog it down. "You said earlier that your teachers, well, I believe you called them "bastards". You say the villagers hate you so much that you're afraid for us. You've said that you trust easily, and I can tell that it's a desperate trust. Why?"

"I can't tell you." He managed, and he licked his lips when he saw the disappointment in her eyes. It was so much worse up close. "Seriously. I can't tell you. There's a law about it." One eyebrow arched in confusion. "Hell, I didn't know about it until a couple months ago. I'll tell you anything you want to know, Grandma, as long as I actually can."

"'Grandma'?" She breathed, and Naruto didn't realize how loudly his heart beat until it was thudding in his own ears. She smiled up at Naruto, dimples on her cheeks. "I like that."

He exhaled.

"I'm not used to begging. I won't, if you won't listen to it. But, you say that you will keep Haruka and I close?" Naruto nodded quickly, trying to remember how to breathe and speak at the same time. "I refuse to allow you to let me stay idle. I want to work. Haruka needs to work. Of all the things that we've lost through the years, our pride is among the last relics we had from the start. I'm too proud to do nothing, Naruto. You might be a ninja, and you might be a fighter, but you're still a boy, and I won't let you live like this." Her last few words were almost spat, and her head twisted around to glance at the apartment. Naruto followed her glance in confusion, still trying to figure out what to say. "You say that you lived on your own from an absurd age. I can only believe you, and that only makes this village lower in my esteem. No one taught you how to clean, or how to wash dishes, or how to wash your own clothes. You just had to figure it out on the way."

She whipped her head back at him, and Naruto suddenly realized that Makoto, despite being old, despite being a civilian, was a fighter. The expression in her eyes was the same look of determination that Kakashi had in his when in battle. It was the same look that Sakura faded into during training, a sight that was becoming more common with every passing month. It was an expression that Sasuke seemed born with, one that took all but the apocalypse to wipe away. Naruto knew at that moment that, if circumstances had been different, if Makoto had some secret bloodline limit, that she would be plowing a straight line from his apartment straight to the Hokage's tower, and anyone in her way was damned from the start.

"You didn't deserve that. You say that there's a reason why everyone hates you. If you were the Devil himself, I don't think that would be enough of a cause for what's been done to you."

A chill sank through him. She was so damn close to the truth that he wanted to speak out, to say that it wasn't the Devil, but a nine-tailed being of pure hatred. He was stopped, though, by the way her hand covered his. He inhaled again, and her hand actually clenched around his, like she was trying to comfort_ him_. "What I mean to say," she began, "is that I will work. I'll work to teach you these things, these simple things like cleaning your floors and buying groceries because no one else ever seemed to care."

"Hey! I know how to clean fine!"

There was a pause. Makoto actually turned around in her chair to face him, and after a small staring contest, he glanced away. "Okay. Got your point. But, you shouldn't need to do this for me. You're family. Hell, you're more than that. You're a _grandmother._ Work should be the last of your worries."

Makoto blinked. "Why is that?"

"Well, because you're _old_." He emphasized the last part, pulling his hands from under hers to spread them out. "Old people aren't supposed to work. They're supposed to, I don't know, knit and gossip and stuff."

The older woman opened her mouth a few times, nothing escaping her lips but air. He appeared torn between a scream and a sigh. Finally, one hand pinched the bridge of her nose, and she fell into familiar, hysterical snickers. "Old doesn't mean _dead_, Naruto. I'm only fifty two. I don't think I'll ever be as "old" as you think I should be. I've never gossiped, I only know how to knit scarves, and both of those are rather boring." She looked at him again, and snorted. "Naruto, if something happened, and you were told that you couldn't be a ninja anymore, what would you do?"

He blinked. "Well, duh. I'd be a ninja anyway. Screw them."

"Exactly!" She crowed. "I can't be a wife anymore. Toppu is nearly a decade gone. I can't be the head of my household, because my household has been naught but ash for longer than I would care to remember. But, when I see you, I see the fact that I am still needed. I suppose that, through all these years, and through all of my troubles, I have been and still am a teacher. I taught my husband to dance, I taught my son how to sew, and I taught my daughter how to win in a bar fight."

"...Wait, _you've_ been in bar fights?" His eyes must've been too wide, because Makoto laughed again. taking the handkerchief from his hand and pocketing it again.

"Naruto, if you're willing, I could use some help with the rest of the laundry. I could tell you the story on the way down?" Her tone was so hopeful at the end that, even if she was suggesting cutting off his hand and selling it as a dog toy, he would've followed her all the way and loaned her the knife.

He nodded dumbly, and she beamed back at him as she stood.

"So, I was eighteen, and Arashi was, at that point two. Toppu gained favor from a local lord who invited us to..."

* * *

Sweet _heavens_. This chapter was supposed to be shorter than the last two. It was also supposed to be relatively angst free. It was _also_ supposed to be about Team 7. 

Guess what? It's** not**.

Despite that, I'm pretty proud of this one. I hope I managed to write about half of it in one day, which, of course, gives no excuse as to why the earlier part of it took so long to get out. I blame the ten hour work days, and the fact that I've sworn off soda completely since the last update. I feel that it's semi-coherent, and I'm almost positive that this chapter has a purpose. Oh, bonus points to anyone who can guess where I'm from by the breakfast.

Anyway, I want to thank everyone for all the reviews so far. It's an amazing response, and I'm floored every time I get feedback becasue I know from experience that it takes a lot of effort to actually say something.

I can say that in the next chapter, there's going to be Team 7 interaction. Honestly, I'm not quite sure what's going to happen because I've just recently figured out that my initial time line is going at a rather slow pace. To point, this is now chapter seven, and in my initial time line, it's _almost_ at the end of chapter three. Also, if Word Count keeps increasing like it has been, the next chapter will also be eighty pages long.

But, hope you enjoyed reading this chapter, and I want to thank you for reading the fic so far. ...Have a nice day?

Man, I even suck at keeping the A/N short. That's a new low.

9/17 - Clarified "coffee" issue. Thanks for pointing it out!


	8. Applied Fashion Technology

Chapter 8

The worst part about waiting alone was the fact that, for some reason, the mind was hard-wired to _think_ when it had nothing else to do. Naruto scowled as he crossed his arms for the tenth time in a quarter hour, trying to figure out if he resented the fact that he had to stand on his toes to see over the edge more than fact that no one was paying any attention to him.

He felt completely naked.

He wasn't, as the Hokage had threatened to ban ramen from Konoha if Naruto didn't wear clothes within the boundaries of, at the very least, the Fire Kingdom, as just Konohagakure might be too limited an area. He had been five, and it had been winter, and the most recent of his caretakers could no longer keep up with him. They figured at the time that he'd either run out of energy or get frostbite, and of course, neither had happened.

Aside from "The Incident" during the Academy's swimming proficiency exams, an event still mentioned faithfully every year on it's anniversary by those who had the luck (or misfortune, depending on who you asked) to be there, Naruto had followed through with his (violence-induced) promise to Sarutobi, faithfully wearing something resembling either clothes or a shinobi uniform every day.

There were many ways to describe Naruto Uzumaki. Depending on who you asked, he was a child of Konohagakure, a shinobi of the Hidden Leaf, an enthusiastic connoisseur of ramen, a strange blonde, a hyperactive brat, and most frequently, the vessel of the Kyuubi no Kitsune. If those same people were asked to assign a color to Naruto, no difference among opinions, no gap between age or gender, no amount of experience would change the fact that, if that person had even the slightest conversation or the merest passing glance exchanged with Naruto, the color would inevitably be "orange".

Perhaps that was why, when faced with a Naruto that didn't have a scrap of orange on him, the entirety of Konoha couldn't connect the hyper-active, color-blind Kyuubi-vessel with the scowling, fidgeting blonde sitting on the bridge.

Naruto could remember exactly where he got his faithful orange jumpsuit. All through his life, the blonde had difficulties not just buying from merchants, but even entering their stores. This made even simple tasks like buying groceries a test of speed, stealth, and timing. When given a further ultimatum during his first week of the academy - a shinobi uniform had to have _some_ sort of built-in protection and no, Naruto, cardboard doesn't count - Naruto had faced the conundrum of where exactly he'd find something resembling armor that was both functional and anywhere close to his size.

Like with most of the great problems in his life, he found, if not the answer, a solution at Ichiraku's.

There were many other faithful customers at Ichiraku's. Naruto believed whole-heartedly that it wasn't just because their ramen was the greatest in the world - a fact that was, in all actuality, as undisputed as the ideas that water is wet, the sun rises, and strange barking noises in the night tend to be Inuzuka - but because the restaurant itself was full of heart, and was a place that you _did _want to go to again, and again, and in Naruto's case, again and again after that. There were few customers that came as often as Naruto did in a single week, but many of the regulars had their own patterns of appearances. Tanaka would show up on Thursdays, and Naruto would sit at the counter because she would sit at the table across from his booth and glare at him if he didn't. Takeshi would come Tuesdays and Fridays, and always sat away from the shinobi. Naruto didn't like him because he slurped his noodles, but left the broth of the noodles in the bowl, an act which was an official declaration of war against Naruto Uzumaki in everything but a notarized document.

Naruto "outranked" most of the customers in there in that he'd come there longer than he could tie his own shoes, could out eat any of them, and had, in fact, beta-tested seven new dishes considered favorites by many (though, his review of each of those had been "Mmmmph! More, please!"). Because of this, he'd won something from the customers of Ichiraku's, even if he couldn't name it. It most likely wasn't respect, and if it wasn't acknowledgemant (as that had been a rare thing, limited to only the past few months and rare occasions before that), it was most likely tolerance. Anyone who glared at Naruto (aside from Tanaka-san), hissed at him or cussed under their breaths at him (again, except for Tanaka-san), or used any sort of physical attack on him (one of the few offenses that Tanaka-san hadn't retaliated at him with. Yet.), was instantly banned for life from Ichiraku's. At first, it'd lost a large amount of business for the then-tiny stand, but over the years, the quality of service, food, and enviroment won more converts, and the only rules that needed to be enforced were Naruto's.

But, there was one customer that even Naruto had the highest respect for - an old man named Shigure. Naruto hadn't ever learned the geezer's last name, and part of Naruto thought that perhaps the old man had forgotten it himself. Shigure had been wizened, bent, and gnarled like the most twisted tree in Konoha's forests. What teeth he had left were yellow, or a deeper color than that, and his breath continually smelled horrible, except for when it was full of food, a occasion that the whole restaurant could identify because Shigure couldn't (or wouldn't) eat with his mouth closed. One of his eyes was colored Hyuuga-white from cataracts, and he never ate with anything but his left arm. In one of his first encounters with the old man, a young Naruto had asked why that was. Shigure had responded by pulling back the knotted end of his sleeve, where a twitching, puckered stump occasionally spasmed, attached at his elbow and dotted with a few knobs that Shigure called his fingers. Shigure had never been a shinobi, and had never been anything other than a civilian. He lived his life in Konoha, and a scant number of years after Naruto met him, died in Konoha.

He was a tailor, and his greatest gift to Naruto was worn every day.

Naruto never actually asked _how_ Shigure made clothes. He didn't ask about the old man's home life because it seemed an even more taboo topic than his birth defect, and sometimes, even Naruto could pick up a hint. But, shortly after the Uniform Ultimatum, after having been rejected from the tenth vendor, he had been drowning his woes in his fifth bowl of ramen. Shigure had beckoned him from the restaurant and into an alley just across the way. The fact that he actually did so in spite of his past experiences with being pulled into dark alley ways showed just how much Shigure was respected, if not completely admired.

Shigure had pressed the thick, heavy box into his hands, and watched with a toothless grin as Naruto had opened it. The kyuubi-vessel could still remember the way his uniform felt the first time he touched it, the way that the fabric had been rough, the color nearly blinding, and the rough, uneven edges on the leather patches that had been hand sewn onto the sleeves. The insides were of a slightly softer fabric that could be torn easily to make haphazard bandages, easily replaced. Between the two sides of his jacket, there was even room for the thick leather padding Naruto would acquire in later years, and dozens of hidden "compartments" for him to stash his kunai, shuriken, and assorted odds and ends.

Whenever people made fun of his uniform, or "kindly" informed him that "don't shoot me" orange wasn't the best color for a ninja, Naruto would flip them the bird and move on. Whenever the thick denim of his outfit got torn, he carefully stitched it back together, as he knew that Shigure couldn't do it anymore, six feet under for going on years. Whenever he needed to think about why he became a ninja (because being Hokage and being a ninja were, for a short period of time, two completely different matters), he thought of the old man who laughed with his mouth open, told stories that had the whole room transfixed, and gave a small boy his first gift.

He hadn't been without it for nearly four years, and today, he was completely nude.

The day had started off well, and if Naruto was honest with himself, still wasn't going badly enough to cancel out his excellent morning. He had something resembling an agreement with Makoto, and he managed to talk to her about it without using kunai or violence, and only a few mild threats that slipped out, which she saw through anyway. His grandmother and aunt would be with him for at least a little longer, and that alone was enough to slip a small, pleased smirk onto his face. Makoto knew as much about being a grandmother as he knew about being an acrobat, which meant the basics and only a few ideas after that. So, when he inevitably screwed up, they could figure out why, fix it, and move on. All that seemed to stretch on in the future for Naruto's new family was the challenge of getting to know each other. He'd already observed a few things, shinobi skills making their appearance as for once, he was completely focused on remembering every small detail about her, from the way her hair caught stray sunbeams, to the fact that wrinkled her nose when she was puzzled.

Makoto was an excellent story teller. The night before, she spoke of her husband as a natural source of charisma, a leader who commanded respect and attention. Naruto wondered at just how powerful of a leader his father (and didn't that phrase just beat all?) had been, because Makoto herself demanded respect. He'd first noticed it in the restaurant, with her "royal" posture, but she had the natural way of just drawing eyes towards her, as if there was a magnet in everyone's eyes that just latched onto her as she passed by. Every story she told, and there had been a few so far, had been engaging and as real as if he was standing on the battlefields, in the fields, or in the bar himself. She left out no details, and she painted her village so richly that though she said it had burned down, it was as if she were looking at it as she spoke.

She'd shown him how to properly fold his clothes while absent-mindedly telling him about her bar fight, and how certain kinds of liquors would catch on fire. She told him which kinds these were in the same teaching tone she used to show which soaps were used with which of his colored clothes, and he found himself so enraptured by her that he couldn't help but agree with her on everything she said because otherwise, there was a pause in the story. "Could you lift that bin for me, Naruto?" was followed a few bar fight details later with "Could you reach that box of soap on that ledge?", which transitioned into "Goodness, your uniform looks filthy! You even slept in it. Here, let me wash that for you." He'd nodded happily before he even knew what she said, and his pants were halfway down his ankles before she covered her eyes and led him back to his apartment.

For the first time in years, he completely emptied out his pockets, searched the lining of his pants, and dug at the hidden, forgotten compartments spread through his clothing. He had eighteen kunai, thirteen shuriken, a spool of trip wire, three explosive notes, two smoke bombs, a small signaling mirror, and a small waterproof tin with some matches, some fire starter, and a small ball of lint. At the time, he'd scratched his head sheepishly, explaining that he'd just come back from training and hadn't restocked yet. Makoto had started to say something, but ended up shaking her head, ruffling his hair, and picking up his uniform with a surprised expression. That led to him removing the thick layers of leather, a task he hadn't done since he'd gotten them, setting them aside, and trying to figure out exactly what he was going to do with them. He'd ended up draping it across his workbench's chair, an act that gained a small nod from Makoto and a blossoming warmth in his belly.

Makoto practically threw him in the shower, and he had to figure out himself exactly what the difference between ultra-hold shampoo and ultra-hold conditioner was, while trying not to wrinkle his nose at the fact that his body was was scented like oranges, his shampoo like coconuts, and his conditioner like lavender. In all, he came out smelling like a fruit basket, and he figured that the only way he wouldn't stick out during today's training session was if they were doing it either completely underwater, or in the middle of Ino's flower shop.

He'd barely gotten out of the shower when Makoto came up behind him with a smile and a brush, and offered to brush his hair. Had he known that the hair brush counted as an Official Tool of Naruto Torture, he would've thought about refusing (as actually refusing might of made her cry, which was unforgivable). As a result, his hair was sleek, shiny, and spiked up so much that he thought he'd impale his fingers on them as he ran them through, an act that he couldn't help doing.

His clothes were too tight, too loose, and too unfamiliar to him to be anywhere close to comfortable. His hair felt heavy, his skin felt far too silky, as if the fox was pushing it's energy into it again, and he had time to_ think_.

It was ten in the morning, and Naruto Uzumaki was in unfamiliar territory.

It wasn't as if the clothes were _that_ uncomfortable. They'd all come from Naruto's closet, and he'd worn them all before on an individual basis. In general, Naruto's clothes were divided into two categories: those that didn't fit him, and the clothes he was wearing at the time. Honestly, Shigure's uniform was only just starting to get small for him, a fact that sincerely irritated the twelve-year old. They started to pinch around his legs, and his shoulders had started to feel cramped by the jacket. What he was wearing now was completely the opposite, as he'd gotten them from the pawn shop (for a premium), and everything he got there was large, torn, stained, or otherwise not what he'd prefer to be in public in. Or, they had been.

Makoto had found the over sized white pullover sweatshirt he'd used as a tent during the winter when he was eight and the heat went out. He fit in it slightly better than before, but it still barely brushed the tops of his knees, and the sleeves had been so big on his arms that he and Makoto had criss-crossed strips of fabric from a dark blue shirt Makoto had deemed beyond any and all repair all the way from his wrists to his elbows to actually allow him to see his hands. The pocket in the front of his sweatshirt could fit a family of four, and the hood in the back probably doubled as a wind sock for the top of the Hokage's tower. The black pants were only a bit better. Belts were a liability for shinobi, but that was only when the belts could be _found_. Under the eight layers of his sweatshirt, leather padded armor, and undershirts, the triple captain-knotted belt couldn't be discerned from the rest of him. When he'd gotten them, the pants would've fit comfortably only on something eight feet tall and just as wide (like say, a tree), but Makoto had taken a pair of scissors and a needle and string and sliced, sewed, and grappled with the fabric until they were only a bit loose around the ankle, a fact which Makoto remedied by using _more_ fabric to criss-cross them into a manageable state.

The only pieces he still felt comfortable with were his sandals, something that no shinobi would part with for anything other than an official pardon from jail, and his hitai-ite, which was currently hung around his neck. Makoto had arranged his bangs just so that they didn't hang over his eyes - a difficult feat even for someone who knew his kind of hair. Naruto thought that his hair cooperated soley because Makoto actually threatened it with a pair of scissors. Added to that was the fact that it wasn't just daylight, it was _bright_ daylight - still before noon. The glare had been so bad that, taking five steps outside, Naruto had darted back to his apartment to dig through his things, finding his old goggles in a drawer of his workbench, wrapped in cloth and shoved in the back. They fit a bit tight, as Naruto hadn't actually worn them over his _eyes _since before he became genin, but they at least let him make out his surroundings without going blind.

Of course, he still had the small shuriken holders strapped to his thighs, and he found that the criss-crosses of fabric made excellent kunai holders. The over-sized hood actually could hold extra weapons, and Makoto made a quick pocket just so they wouldn't fly up and bash him on his head. His grandmother had also, after seeing the weapons he'd previously had stashed in his orange sweat suit, even passed him something she swore up, down, and sideways _wasn_'_t_ a purse. She called it a courier's bag ...and he called it a purse. It was an unassuming washed out blue that neither clashed nor specifically brought out any other color in his outfit. Makoto had said, however, that it went well with his eyes, and if she gave him a feather boa and sequined slippers, he'd have worn those too. Everything else under the sun fit in the bag, including a large wrapped lunch that Makoto told him wasn't a bento, but a lunch from out west, from the lands where she grew up. He'd sworn not to open it until lunch, and trying to guess what it was inside ate at him ferociously, in a horrible ironic twist.

Aside from feeling uncomfortable in his comfortable clothes, irritated that no one was scowling at him, and nervous that everything seemed to be going fantastic for him, he was also buzzing with a thousand questions, and the fact that his brain actually wanted to think about them was a new, unfamiliar, frightening sensation.

After bashing his heel against a particularly jutting stone in the bridge for the fifth time, he cursed, and hopped back onto the rather busy merchant's street. Heavily laden carts passed by, with large mules tugging at their reins as half-asleep, lazy looking farmers sat in the driver's seats. Civilian children ran by, squealing and laughing in a way that Naruto hadn't for a very long time, as long as you counted "a very long time" as being "since his last big prank". What was even scarier than the fact that the townsfolk were just walking by him, sometimes giving him a smile or a greeting, was the fact that _shinobi _were doing the same thing. Naruto was shocked, and he darted into a shop to get his bearings. There was no way, he rationalized, that just a change of outfit could possibly make him invisible to people - no way that changing one thing would make so much of a difference.

But, as he looked around the small general store he'd entered, he found that even the shop's owner just smiled and greeted him, even bowing slightly. "Welcome to my store! It's an honor to have a Shinobi of the Leaf in my humble store. Please, take your time."

Despite himself, Naruto's eyebrows raised, his jaw opening slightly. No one had ever used "honor" in a sentence that referred to him, unless it was prefixed by "You have no". He found himself nodding dumbly, and speeded into an aisle where he didn't have direct eye contact with the shopkeeper.

It was like what he was feeling when he woke up this morning was true, and he really _was_ in another dimension. He extended his hands, glancing at them just to make sure that they were real, and he even cast a quick dispelling jutsu just to make sure it wasn't some trippy illusion cast by someone particularly malevolent.

Nothing changed, and Naruto realized that everything did.

The idea popped into his head as strongly as if someone whispered it into his ear beside him. If a single change of clothes made everybody see him as something he wasn't, maybe all they saw was the clothes, and not the person.

He bit his lip, frowning despite himself as he absent mindedly turned a can of peas over in his hand. Everyone in Konoha treated him as the Kyuubi no Kitsune, with the exception of the people who treated him as a social pariah and didn't know about the Kyuubi, and the further exceptions of the people who actually treated him like a human being. If he had reacted a certain way to them all these years - with pranks, resentment, and anger - and they reacted back at him with more resentment and anger, then what would happen if he changed how he reacted?

He sank against the row of cans, suddenly clubbed by the world's largest invisible, immaterial sumo wrestler. The shopkeeper glanced at him through the converse mirror oddly, but Naruto only half-registered the puzzled gaze, the rest of him struggling to cope with his idea. He kept thinking that when he became Hokage, things would change. He kept believing that they would acknowledge him in a good way. Already, he knew that he could get recognition and acknowledgement, but only in a negative way, through snarls and muttered comments and the occasional shinobi-chase across the rooftops of the village. He realized now that it wasn't going to happen over night. The day he became Hokage - and that day _would_ come - it wasn't as if the minute that stupid looking hat touched his head, he'd be covered in a holy light, and all the people of Konoha would collapse to their knees and cry. It was more likely that he wasn't even going to be Hokage at all if _he_ wasn't the one to change.

But, and his gaze focus far away, through six inches of solid steel and cement reinforced walls, past the six other buildings in the row, far over the horizon and beyond the borders of Konohagakure, how could anybody change that much?

The shopkeeper cleared his throat, and before he could say anything, Naruto darted through the aisle, skidding past what he was looking for and turning back on his feel for it. He grabbed a pack of pens and a small notebook, doubling back into the previous aisle for a bottle of milk and a fruit of some kind - he couldn't tell. He dashed up to the register, dug out Gama-chan, his well-worn wallet, and panted as the shopkeeper eyed him. "Do I know you?"

"Nope. You won't when I'm through, either." As soon as his change hit his hand, he was gone.

* * *

Naruto bit into the orange, fangs squirting juices maliciously close to his eye. He peeled back the rind, scraping off the white, unknown substance that might as well have come from space for all that he knew about it. The flesh of the orange was bitter, with just a taste of sweet that faded into something foul the longer you dwelled on it. He washed it down with some milk, and found that the two flavors clashed horribly. With a grimace, he set both down and turned back to the notebook. 

He had a million, no a hundred-million questions, and as soon as he picked up a pen and opened the first page of the crisp, new paper, all of those had flown out the window. All he had at the top of the paper, underlined to the point of tear through the other side, was "Stuff I need to change". He frowned, flipped that page over, and started a new one. "Questions".

"Okay," he murmured to himself, sucking his lip, "There's stuff I want to know." He thought back to last night, and even the afternoon, when he'd first met Makoto and Haruka, before he knew they were family. He thought back to when he was searching for information on the Yondaime, and had to concentrate hard to summon up the knowledge that his bunshins had gathered.

Aside from the fact that it hurt like a bitch, the main problem with "info overflow" was the fact that it did mess around with the information. He might remember some stuff as clear as day - right now, he could recite fifteen pages of the Konohagakure Shinobi/Civilian Work Agreement, and he really, really regretted it. On the other hand, everything he might pick up from his clones might be in complete gibberish - a sentence there, a word there, and a paragraph from a dozen different sources made for really mixed up reading. He had to concentrate, his fists flexing with the unfamiliar strain, and finally categorized the few documents he'd found yesterday.

The Yondaime Hokage - he now knew for sure that it was Kazama Arashi, his father - was a shinobi of the leaf (well, duh). He'd been a jonin instructor, and had a team consisting of "Suzuko Rin", "Uch----" someone, and he thought the "----ito" matched with that, and "Ytwute Krnazafrm ", the last one being a rough approximation due to horrible handwriting. He figured the "Uch" was an Uchiha, the only problem with that being that they were pretty much all dead. He had absolutely no clue where he'd find the "Ytwute" clan, and that only left "Rin" as a lead. He tapped the paper with his pen. He'd never heard of anyone named Rin or named Suzuko. If she were alive today, and if she were a genin back then, she'd probably be close to her thirties. If she followed through with being a ninja, and if she hadn't died, she would probably have been a jonin instructor, or an ANBU. He paused. He wrote "M?" next to Rin's name, because Rin might of well been a boy, for all that he knew "Krnazafrm"s gender, even assuming that back then, they followed the "Two Dudes and a Chick" rule for team formations.

He circled "Suzuko". "I guess," he muttered, "this is my best shot." He doodled off to the edge, bobbing his foot up and down. "Okay. Let's say she's dead. He's dead. Whatever. Two ways for a shinobi to die. In a mission, or slipping in the bathtub or choking on a potato or something. If it's the potato, I got nothing, because the Hokage tends to keep those kinda embarassing deaths quiet." He drew dots around the circle. "Dead on a mission. She'd be on the Memorial Stone."

He stopped. Every time he'd been anywhere close to the Memorial Stone, it involved getting the crap kicked out of him. Even on the occasions that Kakashi had called that their meeting place, he'd got nothing but dirty looks. This wasn't even counting the time that he'd been jumped there when he was a kid for having the gall of doing a school project there. But, and he sighed heavily, it was the best lead he had on getting more info on his father. As a genin, "BIRCH" had probably been his only brush with that sort of administration paperwork, and he'd probably never have to do paperwork there again. Aside from that, all the info he'd need would be in the Hokage's office, and he'd probably _need_ to be Hokage to read them. He knew nothing about any other projects his father had been on, and there was absolutely nothing on Arashi's own genin team. Makoto had mentioned something about a "Jiro". If she remembered correctly, he could ask her and Haruka more questions later.

He paused. On the other hand, maybe he could get some information about the Uchiha. He could either beat the crap out of Sasuke...somehow, and get information from there. He was sure that the old clans had huge geneology books so they could carefully plan their massive inbreeding. Anyway, if his father was as fantastic a ninja as the legends said - he mentally scratched out the "if" with a surge of familial pride - then his genin would have to be complete idiots not to be good at what they did, too. If "-ito" was as old as Rin, he'd be just before his thirties, if he were alive. At the time of the whole "Uchiha Massacre" thing, he would've been early twenties, which for a shinobi was their prime. He would've had to be a complete loser to die during that, so he must've died before. On the notebook, he drew "Uch. Ito.". He drew two lines from that name, labeled "potato" and "mission".

With a stroke of genius, he wrote "awards".

His father was a genius - everybody who described the Yondaime had nothing but fantastic things to say about him. There would have to be awards - either for him, or for his genin. With a grin, he bit into the rest of the orange while writing another word in block letters. "Library". Bureaucracy only had so much to say about a person, and the rest of it was recorded by the people who knew them and the (good) things that they did. Shinobi didn't have newspapers - it seemed like a waste of time when any good shinobi knew what happened before the reporter even got there - but civilians did. He'd seen it before, had slept on it a couple of times, and had most often used it in pranks, once coating every object in Iruka's school office in a double coating of it. Civilians either didn't know or didn't care about all the shinobi rules of secrecy. There was a chance that, like with the misfiled triplicate receipt in BIRCH, he'd find something.

It took less than a minute to pack up his gear, and less than a half hour to enter the library, twenty of those minutes having been spent asking around for wherever it was located. The outside of it was nondescript, with the small metal sign "Konohagakure Library" mounted near a corner stone. Naruto cautiously opened the front door, wincing as he realized the air in it was completely and utterly cold. He saw clouds of his own breath, and tried to ignore the goose pimples prickling up on his skin. There was a short glass hallway - in case of invasion, it could be securely locked from inside the building, a security feature a lot of new buildings had - before sliding glass doors opened into the main room.

It looked like a small library, with one central room that had three stories worth of books, a maze of ladders, and a small collection of wooden tables off to the side, with a smattering of small, comfortable looking red chairs in isolated corners. The librarian - a woman so old that "rocks" were a new, exciting invention - glanced up quickly, frowned at him, then bent her head back down. Naruto saw her long, pink-painted fingernails turn another page in what he could _swear_ was Icha Icha Paradise. He shivered, and it wasn't from the cold this time.

After walking the aisles for a good thirty minutes with absolutely no clue of what exactly he was looking for, how to find it, or why exactly he was there, he stopped. He did a quick check for security cameras, and found the only one pointed at the doorway. He did a quick pulse with his chakra, and found that the librarian was the only other living thing in the library. With a grin, he formed the seal for Kage Bunshin, concentrating his chakra until he felt like it was about to burst out of him, and whispering the technique name.

He managed about twenty clones to start with, and he was impressed with the improvement over the previous day. His clones glanced around, several shivering, a few scratching themselves idly. Foreman approached him, and the original Naruto acknowledged him with a quick nod. "Searching for stuff on Arashi Kazama and Yondaime, same as yesterday. Look for crap on Suzuko Rin and some Uchiha 'bout the same age, with "-ito" in his first name." The foreman raised an eyebrow, and opened his mouth to yell. Naruto waved his hands furiously. "Library! We have to be quiet, you know? I don't want that old harpy bitching at us, or worse - ratting us out to Old Man Sarutobi. Think of it," and he paused, "as an exercise in stealth or something."

The foreman frowned and nodded, and Naruto realized for the first time that all of his bunshins were dressed in his familiar orange jumpsuit. His eyes widened, and his brain stopped, his thoughts trying to figure out just what that meant, and why exactly it was significant. The clones quickly got to work, some scaling the walls using their borrowed chakra, others acting as lookouts as a single Naruto at a time approached the card catalog. The original Naruto watched for a moment, then pulled out his notebook again, opening to the page to "Questions".

"Can make weird Kage Bunshins. Think, Speak, Dress different." He watched Foreman pinch a humming, smiling Naruto who had been carrying a load of books down the aisle, and wrote "personalities." The word felt like it should have weight.

He glanced up. Foreman was speaking to small, three man groups of clones, gesturing strongly and pointing to aisles down the way. Glancing up, Naruto noticed a few Naruto's clinging to the high shelves, completely ignoring the ladders. Foreman waved his attention silently, and gestured with three fingers. Nodding, Naruto obliged three more clones, sent them towards Foreman, and then paused. Under "Kage Bunshins", he added "Why can't clones make clones?" He watched Cheery - because the humming clone's name came as easily as his own - trip on the floor, tears pooling in his eyes. Another passing clone scowled and hit Cheery on the head with a book, prompting a pout from the childish copy. Naruto inhaled sharply. "Bunshins can take more than one hit."

Now he _really_ wanted to go through the Forbidden Scroll again - something told him that there was something going on with his clones. Idly, he flipped back to "Stuff I need to change", and added "Better with Kage Bunshins?" on it. He wondered if there was a way to let his clones make more clones. He already could reinforce the clones he made, and he could already make sure that they could take more than just a small hit (both of which probably violated eighteen rules of chakra physics), and he used clones as focuses already. If there was a way to make one clone able to make, say, three, than those three could make three each, and battles could quickly become mobs, which fit Naruto's fighting style fine. He stopped, and wrote "Sucky Taijutsu". It was a hard admission, but completely true. Under that, he wrote "Worst Genjutsu ever", followed after by "Ninjutsu?". He wasn't quite sure exactly where he rated on that. Surely mastering Kage Bunshin had to count for something there, and he _did_ create a technique of his own, even if it _was_ Sexy no Jutsu. He tapped Ninjutsu, wrote "Sexy" under it, and wrote "Genjutsu?" next to that.

He'd never paid attention during academy lectures, mainly because he'd been busy being a clown, he'd never learn from the teachers, and frankly, he didn't think he needed to learn it at the time. As far as he remembered, Ninjutsu were attacks and techniques that needed chakra to do freaky stuff, taijutsu was just kicking butt with nothing but your own body, and genjutsu was when you used chakra to screw with other people's minds with illusions. If you took those definitions, didn't Henge no Jutsu, his old academy enemy, classify as a genjutsu, and not a ninjutsu? The main difference between Kage Bunshin and the normal Bunshin was, aside from the insane amount of energy it took, the fact that Kage Bunshin were solid, even if it was supposed to only last one hit. Sexy no Jutsu wasn't just an illusion - it _was_ solid. Harem no Jutsu was even worse - he heard it even got an A-rank classification through the Hokage's office because Sarutobi's secretaries caught him passing out whenever he saw it. The difference between Henge, which took on the appearance of someone like, say, Iruka, and Sexy no Jutsu, which took on a made up form, was the massive amount of chakra that the second one took.

Under "Questions", he wrote "high-chakra genjutsu?", and then on the first page, he added "Chakra control", and drew an arrow to it from Genjutsu.

Naruto had all the chakra in the world (and that might not have been an exaggeration), and because of that, he'd never needed delicate control of chakra. Instead of a stream, Naruto had a gigantic river backed by a huge reservoir behind a dam. This was fine for the occasions that Naruto needed to create a tidal wave of chakra to fill up an entire lake - like using his Kage Bunshins, but it sucked for if you just wanted enough water to take a bath with, which the small stream came in handy for. Frowning, he wrote "Too much chakra?" next to Genjutsu. If ninjutsu techniques took more chakra than genjutsus, then it was no wonder why he could do those and not genjutsu. That brought him back to the Forbidden scroll and his monsterous chakra. Most people, and he watched roughly thirty copies of himself dart through the aisles silently, would die if they used Kage Bunshin the same way he did - the just didn't have the huge river or the gigantic resovoir to fuel it. They were "small streams", and they'd never form tidal waves or fill lakes, or do anything that he could. However, if _he_ could find a way to make his large river narrow into a small stream, he'd have the best of both worlds, and be able to do large ninjutsu and small genjutsu.

"Boss," Foreman whispered, tapping him on the shoulder. Naruto brought out of thought, snapping the notebook shut and whipping around to look at his clone. While it was possible to keep track of where his clones were through his connections to them, it was impossible to use the same "chakra radar" he used with other people, as his clones just were a part of himself, and faded into the background. As it was, Naruto believed that Foreman, and a few of the others, took sadistic pleasure in sneaking up on him.

"Yeah? What the hell is it?" Naruto snapped, frowning at the Foreman. To his credit, his main clone was mature, and only sighed before passing a stack of papers to his creator.

"The "info overflow" is gonna suck tonight, first off." Foreman's tone almost seemed sincerely regretful. "Just thought I'd let you know, so you can, I don't know, think about it or something. Anyway, we've had some luck with it - you had a good hunch earlier with the awards. Suzuko Rin had some early education through the civilian school system, and that led us to some early paperwork about land leases and crap." The clone scratched his cheek. "Glasses - I call him "Prick", really, but you can call him what the hell you want - is writing a summary of that all. It'll probably call you stupid, just to warn you about that, too." Naruto thought for a moment, and remembered the snobbish, Uchiha-like clone that translated the Fire Lord's book yesterday. The fact that one clone named another didn't escape him, though he had no clue what to make of that, either. "Anyway, Rin - girl, by the way. Nice instincts - led us to Arashi, who it turns out _did_ have some civilian education." At the original's questioning look, he continued. "See, when he came over from that village near the Rock, Grass, and Rain borders (Hey, boss, does it have a shorter name?), he hadn't had any formal education. Here, we do that whole crappy civilian, then shinobi education progression thing. But, there, I guess Makoto home-schooled him or something like that. Anyway, Arashi had to take a whole bunch of tests to grade intelligence and skill level and crap. Look at the first one."

Naruto peered down curiously, mumbling the first few lines to himself. "Kazama Arashi. Status: Civilian, Land of Rock. Age Seven. Reading Comprehension Acuity Percentage... Applied Physical Theory... Euclidean-Chakra Dexterity Grade..." he glanced up, "I don't have a damn clue what any of these numbers mean." He glanced down again, and moved his thumb. "IQ. Oh." Foreman was decidedly not staring at him. "Right." He glanced cat the number, paused, and checked it again. "What the hell?!"

"Yep. When they say the Yondaime was a genius...they weren't joking around. The rest of the test scores are all the same. The only one he ever sucked at was, oddly enough, his vision test." Foreman plucked at one paper in the bottom of the stack, half-wet with hastily scribbled ink in impeccable scrawl. He passed it to the Original, who regarded it silently. "Turns out your pop was color blind. Go figure."

"...Huh. You know, I've never been tested for this whole Euclidean-Chakra Dexterity thing. Hell, I don't think I got a vision test ever. This sucks. Hey," and he glanced up, "you don't think that _I _could be-" Foreman cut him off with a loud snort that morphed into half-muffled hysterical giggles. "Hey! She'll hear you!"

"Nope!" A sentry called, sparing a glance back at the original before resuming his duties, "I think she reached a steamy part in the book. We could probably dance naked through these aisles and she wouldn't budge."

"...Okay." The Kyuubi-vessel took a brief glance at the rest of the papers. In between an entry in the Civilian System's record books for highest IQ and fastest reading speed and a small blurb talking about Suzuko Rin's award winning peonies, he found a picture, hastily torn from a book. "Did you?-" he only began yelling when Foreman had the gall to "shush" him, the clone's fingers over the original's lips.

"Look, we'll replace it later, okay? Just...take a look at it." Foreman's tone was almost pleading, and Naruto had been a sucker for that lately.

It was black and white, the paper slightly yellowed. One clone had scribbled the source - "Konoha's Guide for a Good time, P. 67" on the edge of the paper, and he glanced at that idly before focusing on the picture itself. His _father_ stood in the back, hands outstretched, a grin cemented on his face so far that it looked like it would burst off the page itself. In front of him stood two children, (two _shinobi, _he corrected himself), a girl with short hair in a light color, facial decorations almost similar to an Inuzuka, smiling indulgingly, and a slightly taller boy with a shock of spiky black hair, a pair of something like goggles covering his eyes. The boy was holding a plaque that Naruto could only just make out as "Inter-Village Skee-Ball Champion". If Naruto didn't know any better, he would've sworn he inherited his foxy grin from this boy. Breathless, he read the caption. "Beating out ninja from four other villages, Uchiha Obito (chuunin) secured the title of Skee-Ball Champion in this year's contest, taking place at Konoha's historic Fun-Fun Arcade. Pictured is his team: Kazama Arashi (instructor), Suzuko Rin (chuunin). Not pictured, H-". Naruto glanced up, and Foreman scratched his chin.

"Er, yeah. Sorry about that. When the clone ripped out that picture, he kinda tore up the rest of the page, too. Can't make that last one out. But, hey, at least you know where you got our good looks from, right?" Foreman bent over, one finger hovering just over Arashi's head. "He's got your grin and all. Go figure."

A smile slipped onto Naruto's features, wavering between a smirk and a grin. He felt like he wanted to laugh suddenly, and Foreman caught his eyes. "Yeah, it's awesome, isn't it?" Foreman shook his head, almost looking mature. "Anyway, I'm not sure we'll find much more here, but then again, Obito was all you were looking for, right? At least you have a starting point." He paused. "I've actually been wondering what the hell you were planning about the sensory saturation thing, boss. Got any ideas?"

Naruto shook his head. "Nah, I was just gonna suffer through it. I mean, I've done worse than thirty clones before, remember?"

"Yeah, but you wound up with a headache for the rest of the day. Are you sure you wanna go through training today with that in your head?" Naruto sucked on his lip, and Foreman continued. "I was thinkin' about what we normally do in battles and stuff. You know how, when you create like a hundred, and they gradually get all poofed out? What if it's not just the adrenhiline that's blocking you from all the feedback, but the fact that they all gradually poof out? Maybe you could try letting them collapse on a gradual, spaced out period." Naruto stared at his clone until Foreman sheepishly turned his head. "It was just an idea, alright? No need to get pissy about it or nothing. Anyway," and he turned sharply around, "I'm sure Cheery's doing something stupid. I'll let the clones have some free time, if you don't mind. Later!" The orange-clad Naruto jolted off before the original could get a word in edgewise, and Naruto blinked once, then again.

"Okay. Maybe," and he hesitated, tasting the idea, "that would work. I really don't want a headache today - I have to beat the crap out of Sasuke to learn about Obito. Alright." He did a mental count, found that he had exactly thirty clones at the moment who were spaced across the library. One had even been so bold as to take up a seat in one of the comfortable looking red chairs, while a few others were perched _on_ the high shelves, well out of the librarian's view, and just out of the camera's. He walked through the aisles, and only a few Naruto's pulled their heads from their books, magazines, and scattered comic books to glance at him. "Alright. Let's try it. You," he started, and pointed at one Naruto who was running his fingers against the rippling spines on a row of Science Fiction books, "come here."

The clone startled, but came with only a small amount of grumbling. "My turn to get poofed, right?"

Naruto turned his head to the side. "Not sure yet. I'm gonna try to just take a bit of energy, okay? Like giving you Chakra, but in reverse." The clone raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, I don't know what I'm doing either. But, hold still for a moment, and try not to explode or anything."

He reached out with his chakra and found the bright, glowing strands that connected him to the clone standing right before him. He reached out to touch them, not with his hands, but with the almost grotesquely large strands of his own chakra. The sudden contact between the two made both focus on the real world for a moment, and their eyes met. "Maybe if you...?" The clone started, but Naruto already knew what the clone was going to say because somehow, the clone's thoughts were _his_ thoughts, and words were useless when they were already one person in seperate bodies. Naruto reached out with one of his physical hands, resting it on the clones shoulder. It was right. He closed his eyes, and knew that his clone was following because the strands of chakra pulsed in tandem, and Naruto worked with his Chakra until his strands were tied with his clones.

He'd never spent this much time trying to use his own chakra. He wondered if anyone had, because ninjutsu rarely took five mintues to prepare, as ninjutsu that took five _seconds_ to prepare usually got you killed in battle. It was all he could do to take it slowly, and move gently, and twist the clone's tiny strands with his huge, ropelike ones until the two blended even futher. He wondered if _this_ was what Chakra Control was supposed to be, and wondered why the hell no one ever described it like this before. With a small, satisfied noise in the real world, he managed one last turn, and his chakra became his clone's chakra, and his clone's chakra was his, and therefore at his manipulation. It was like having a battery right before him, and Naruto suddenly was filled with a thousand ideas, with the sudden revelation as if he were creating another amazing prank.

His clone was made of part of his chakra, his memories, and his thoughts. All of these were his, and all of them _should_ be his, even when they were in different bodies. He felt his chakra in his clones body, and carefully drained half of it into himself.

They seperated.

The clone looked at him, and blinked. "That was really damn freaky," the clone said. "Is...Is that what it's like?" He started, glancing at the Original with wide eyes, "to be Real, I mean?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Weird."

"That should last about... eh, a half-hour, maybe, if you don't do anything stupid." There was a brief pause between them, and one pair of eyes caught the other. "This is gonna change stuff. Of course," and the clone shrugged with him, "I have no clue what, though."

It really had been a simple matter of draining the rest of the clones as soon as he got the hang of it. By the last clone - Foreman, who he actually added energy into - it took a third as much time, and he could keep his eyes open to do it. "Glasses" gave him the papers which, Foreman was right, _were _derogatory, and Naruto slipped them in the back pages of his notebook before passing by the librarian still entralled in porn, and leaving the library for the blazing hot, horrifyingly bright noon day sun.

It would be ages until even Sakura, who was always early, showed up at the meeting place, and the odds of Kakashi being early were exactly the same odds of Sarutobi shacking up with his son's girlfriend, Kurenai, which was to say nonexistant. He had _hours_ to kill, and were this a normal day, he'd be sleeping through them all.

He paced through the thin side streets of Konoha for a longer while than he could remember, feet finding their way across familiar cobblestones as his mind absently categorized information. Foreman was right after all - having the clones dissapate gradually, not all at once, did help with the information. Hell, he could remember all of it, and that was cause for worry because some of his clones actually liked sleazy romance novels. He shudded.

The library had been a good source of data after all, because it gave him Obito's name, gave him the fact that Rin existed, and was female after all, and gave him another picture of his father (which had been exchanged with a page from his own notebook with the words "I.O.U. money for this book, seriously." where the picture should be). He thought about heading home, back to Makoto. He wondered if Haruka had any luck with finding work, and what work that could be.

He woke from this thoughts to find himself on the civilian observation platform (though, he thought adding "civilian" as a prefix was a bit silly, because _anything_ could be a platform for a shinobi, and if there was a special one built, it wasn't for a ninja) across from the Hokage Monument. His father glanced at him with stony eyes, his expression forever immortalized with thinly pressed lips on an almost feminine face, his expression one of wisdom, determination, and class.

It was completely wrong. Well, Naruto added, except for the feminine face part.

In every picture he'd seen yet of the Yondaime...of Arashi... of his _father_, he'd been grinning, smirking, or smiling widely. Makoto said that he'd been cheerful all of his life, that he couldn't keep a secret, and that he'd loved to laugh. These were not the characteristics of a stotic man. The guy who carved his father's visage was exactly as blind as the old coot who carved Sarutobi's, and he tried to figure out why they decided to carve him as something he wasn't.

"Hell," he muttered to himself, "I'll never figure that out. I'll just have to carve my own face. Otherwise, geez, I can't even imagine what the hell they'd do to me." In truth, he did have an idea, and it involved fox ears and the word "DEMON" on his forehead in letters twenty feet tall.

He locked eyes with his father's. "Okay, I guess I should apologize for that whole graffiti thing." He paused. "Were you the one I put lipstick and mascara on? I can't remember. Anyway, you have to admit that it was a pretty good gag. Hell, it took tons of planning, and you wouldn't believe how hard it was to set up that scaffold without anyone noticing. Well, maybe you would."

There was silence.

"Yeah. Anyway. I'm Naruto Uzumaki. Your son." The blonde inhaled sharply. "Damn, that feels weird. You probably don't recognize me. Hell, you haven't seen me since I was a baby." He stopped, and his fist was clenching. He willed it to calm down, and he sat yoga-style on the scaffold, palms flat on his thighs. "You haven't seen me since the day I was born, when you... you did "it". To me." He stopped, and he could only look down, away from the mountain. "Why?"

"I mean, I couldn't have been the only one born that day. My luck's not that bad, right? Hell, I guess it would be _your_ luck that would suck that day. But, I mean, you could've ..." and he trailed off, because he just couldn't finish that thought outloud. He was going to say that the Hokage could've ordered some other parent to sacrifice their child, and he realized that, even if he knew absolutely nothing about Arashi Kazama, nothing about what kind of man the Yondaime had been, he knew that no Hokage could ever ask that of someone else. A Hokage's duty was to protect his village, and everyone in it. Naruto knew this, accepted it, and began to understand his father's reasoning.

He still knew next ot nothing about what really went on the night the Kyuubi attacked, and he got out his notebook to jot "Kyuubi" in the "Questions" page, circled twice and underlined. He'd seen for himself the estates destroyed, the family names vanished in that three-day seige, and part of him tried to figure out what he would've done in his father's place.

"I guess..." he spoke hesitantly, the words dropping from his tongue so unfamiliar to him that he had to taste each syllable to see if he really meant to say it, "that I couldn't do anything else in your place." He glanced up, and he could swear his father's face changed, but it could've been that he'd changed instead. "Did you know that you were going to die? Did you know that you were going to leave me alone? My mother...what happened to her? What did you expect to happen to me, after you put that seal on me? I just..."

He hung his head. "Yeah, you're not gonna give me any answers. I think I'm starting to get that. Shinobi have to find out their own information - I get that, too." He laughed. "I wonder if you ever sucked with getting the point of stuff, or if you were awful with school like me. Then again, those test scores? Damn intimidating. Hell, I don't think Kakashi-sensei could beat you, and he became genin at like six." He stopped, and his tone became lighter as soon as his thoughts ran away with his tongue. "Did you ever meet Kakashi-sensei? I guess he'd be ...eh, fifteen or so when you died. He's a major pervert, and he's always late, and he always reads these porn books in front of us. Oh!" He stopped, nodding, "Hell, I forgot to mention that he's the jonin sensei for my squad."

"See, there's me, and I'm awesome. I'm completely the leader and..." he trailed off, glanced around quickly, and finding no one nearby, began again. "Okay, yeah. That was a lie. I don't think there really _is_ a leader, except that I tend to do whatever gets me beat up by Sakura less. She's the kunoichi in Team 7 - pink hair, green eyes, huge, strong, terrifying fists of fury. Seriously, if she actually was a brawler, she'd kick my butt in every battle. She's more of a side-lines person." He frowned. "Why do they make girls do that, anyway? I mean, it can't just be the strength thing, because most shinobi do long distance battles anyway. Hell, I heard from somewhere - maybe Old Man Sarutobi who, by the way, is Sandaime again - that the best shinobi battles are over before the opponent knows it began. Sure, I heard Kakashi-sensei say that girls have less chakra, but there's this guy I've heard of - Rock Lee, who studies under this really weird guy who wears these creepy jumpsuits, and he can't use chakra at all. If he's a taijutsu specialist, that means that no one really needs chakra to fight like that. They just need to train like hell."

"Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Sakura. Wait! Let me tell you about this real prick before I get too much into her. His name is Sasuke and..."

* * *

The bells in the Academy's tower tolled four times, and Naruto waited until the last echo faded until he began to speak again. "I guess I should get going." He raised himself up, shaking off the leg cramps and stretching his back until he heard cracks. "I mean, Sakura's probably waiting, and I don't think I've ever arrived early enough to see when Sasuke shows up. I guess I'll talk to you tomorrow." He looked to the sky, and a smile tugged at his lips. "This was nice, Pop." 

From below the platform, he heard the distant laughter of children as the academy let out. A gentle breeze brushed past his face, pulling with it stray paper and debris. "Hm," and he laughed, "I think someone's getting a D-mission today. It's a good thing Kakashi-sensei is only "training" us today."

"Well," and he donned his grandmother's "courier bag", struggling to lift it over his hair without damage to one or the other (and more likely, both), and turned his back. "I suck at this mushy stuff. It's kinda weird talking to the dead, you know? Not like you're gonna answer back or nothing. I'm gonna have to find the answers on my own, and it's not gonna be easy. But, you know what? I'm _still_ gonna be the greatest Hokage ever - better than you. I mean, what did you do? You died fighting a forest critter. How lame is that? I'm gonna have to dig into your past, Pop, just to see if there's something you did that's not wussy."

Naruto wasn't crying. The wind chose instead of implant dust exactly in his eye, and that's why it was watering. The queasy feeling in his stomach was partly due to the fact that he forgot to eat Makoto's lunch, and partly because the Kyuubi was _very_ pissed at being called a "forest critter" and was trying to get him back, and it had nothing to do with the fact that he wished more than anything else in his life that his father would answer back.

"Bye." With that, he jumped off the east face of the ledge, only falling thirty feet before landing safely on a balcony, which led him to the interconnected labyrinth of shinobi rooftop highways. He passed three ninja running errands - one even had the official markings of a courier-nin - and he still couldn't get over the fact that he'd gotten polite nods from all of them.

Sakura was the only one waiting at the bridge, and Naruto felt complete and utter confusion for a moment. Not only was the sensation of being earlier than Sasuke for once very strange, but the idea of being alone with Sakura made his stomach feel even worse.

Like usual, she wore her hair down, and it was caught gently by the breeze. She was leaning against the edge of the bridge in such an experienced manner that, had there been an Shinobi Art of Loitering, she'd have all the great masters of the world begging for lessons. She absent mindedly licked her fingers to turn a page in her book - Naruto couldn't read the cover of it, but it was wrapped in pink - and began to smile, her lips tracing words that, due to the fact that he'd skipped out on most of his lip-reading classes - he couldn't make out.

She paid no attention to him as he took a place directly across from her, and the fact that he was so comfortable with the routine that it didn't bug him anymore still felt like it should. He sat on the rail of the bridge, and after watching her for a few minutes, felt like a stalker. He dug in his pu-_courier's bag_ for his notebook, his hands brushing something unfamiliar. He brought it out, glancing at the cover. "Royal Proclamations of the Fire Lord." He paused for a moment. He absently recalled finding a book the day before, and wondered briefly why it wasn't propping up the kitchen table.

He flipped through the aged pages, trying to figure out if they smelled like new paper or of old age, and found a passage at random. He read through it once, uncrossed his eyes, and read it again, this time tracing the words outloud. "It is therefore the will of the Lord of Dragons, the High Lord of the Fire Kingdom, the Son of the Heavens, the Father of the Nation...". He had to pull the book down incredulously. "Just how many titles does this guy _have_?" He brought the book up again, scanning three quarters of the page down with his fingers until he found the rest of the sentence. "...that all sons are sons of their fathers, all daughters are daughters of their mothers, and all children are the children of their parents, their family, and their Clan."

"...that's _it? _How the hell can anyone read this crap? They'd go _insane._ Geez, even the Bureau of Bureacracy hid this away. What's the point of that sentence anyway?" He frowned, half-wishing that Glasses was here to interpret the book, wishing even more that Glasses wouldn't be a prick about it. He peeked over the edge of the book, where Sakura was still engrossed in hers, the afternoon sun turned the small stream into a river of light, and Kakashi passed by with a brown paper bag full of groceries (complete with a large loaf of bread jaunting out the top), whistling merrily. Naruto blinked.

What was worse than the fact that Sakura didn't react to him was the fact that Kakashi reacted to her, smirking as his eye jerked a fraction of an inch. His whistling didn't stop for a moment, and he passed Naruto by without a word.

Naruto's jaw trembled. He was torn between screaming in rage and beating the hell out of Kakashi-sensei, or screaming in frustration and beating the hell out of Kakashi-sensei because, as it was slowly dawning in his own mind, Kakashi had been testing _her_ all along.

_She_ was the one who was always early, and she was the one who always bitched at him and Kakashi-sensei for being late. In the mean while, because Sakura said Kakashi-sensei never showed up until three hours after the meeting time, he and Sasuke had taken to arriving later and later, which _allowed_ for Kakashi to arrive later and later. He was stunned with the sudden idea that Kakashi wasn't ever late at all, and his hypothesis was proven right when Kakashi passed by Sakura _again_, this time going the opposite direction, carrying a large dog and whistling the same damn tune. He passed three feet in front of her, and she only turned a page in her book.

If he added up all the time he spent waiting for Kakashi-sensei, and combined that with the fact that logically, a Jonin would know better than to be tardy for missions and training, Naruto had wasted almost three months on a test for someone else because no one got the joke.

The side of his cheek twitched, and for a moment, Naruto thought the fox was letting him have a heart attack as payback for the "forest critter" comment. But, his cheek twitched again, and gradually his lips stretched out (almost grotesquely) into a knowing smirk. He felt air pass into his lungs and realized that he was breathing again, counted to fifty backwards, and tried to ignore Kakashi as he passed for the fifth time, this time ferrying five laughing children toting balloons across the bridge. Glancing down, "Proclamations" was still in his hand, fingers frozen on a specific passage. He bent down to read because frankly, going insane from reading obtuse, confusing laws meant that he wasn't already insane to start with, and as he watched Kakashi pass by again and again, he was beginning to doubt that.

"Where _is_ that idiot?!" Naruto jerked his head up from the eight passage he'd discerned so far (the jist of it was "Stealing from somebody is wrong, unless the fire lord is stealing from you, in which case it is called "taxes".") to the sound of Sakura's voice. He saw for the first time the fact that the sky was bridging its way into dusk, odd shadows stretching from the uneven rooftops casting shadows on the stream and bridge, where Sakura stood impatiently, tapping her foot with her arms crossed in a gesture of impending pain. Sasuke lurked to the side, managing to find a shady corner to shuffle himself into despite the fact that the bridge's railing was straight and in broad daylight. Off to the side, Kakashi-sensei stood as immoble and unwavering as a ten foot flag pole, one hand holding his book, the other one combing his hair.

"Aaah, so impatient. Was I ever that young? I'm sure Naruto will be along shortly." He paused. "If he knows what's good for him."

On any other day, this would be the point that Naruto would bound across the rooftops, skidding to the ground in front of them, possibly embedded with several kunai. On any other day, Sakura would beat him even further, Sasuke would sniff and turn away in a manner that translated, in "Uchiha", to "I could've been brooding, but you wasted my time.", and Kakashi would...be somewhere else, because Naruto never arrived after Kakashi.

With a smirk, Naruto folded one corner of the page he'd been reading and stuffed the book back in his bag. He stood, stretched his muscles, and walked over to the three ninja in exactly the same manner a civilian would.

He coughed.

From his angle, Naruto could perfectly see Kakashi's gradually widening eye, the slight lowering of his jaw a testiment to the fact that it was actually dropping. Kakashi stood up straighter, and the hand that had been running through his hair rushed up to cover his mouth. He laughed.

"Aah, sorry, sorry!" He waved one hand limply to his two students, and Naruto noticed how sharply his teacher's gaze was focused on the space between their eyes and him, just watching for something that certainly wasn't coming, because Sakura was still searching the rooftops with an intent to maim (with the possibility of leveling up to "wound", "torture", and "drown in the stream and hang under the bridge"), and Sasuke was still decidedly not looking anywhere at his teacher or team mate. He covered his mouth, hacking in the worst display of acting he'd seen since Shikamaru told Ino that no, that dress didn't make her look fat. (The fact that he'd followed that up with "Your double-chin, however..." put him in the hospital for two days.)

Naurto coughed again.

"I'll kill that idiot for standing us up. He better be lying in a ditch somewhere, because if he slept in again, I'll just..." Sakura glanced up, noting for the first time her teacher's raised eyebrow. "Ah, I mean, I certainly hope that nothing's happened to Naruto. That would be such a _shame_."

Naruto felt the overflow of bubbling affection flowing from Sakura. It went nicely with the fact that she was still radiating enough killing intent that civilans were avoiding her, and several small children began crying as they passed.

Naruto raised his hand to his mouth once more, putting as much force behind his cough as he could.

Sasuke whipped his head around, black locks swaying over his eyes fashionably. "Listen, if you're that sick, go home and die. I don't need to get your germs and miss a mission, civil..." he trailed off, eyes widening in a matter that, for any other person would be normal, but for Sasuke was completely overblown to the point of comedy. The icy, composed Uchiha's mouth gaped for a split second, and Naruto couldn't help but wonder exactly why Sakura's head whipped around to watch Sasuke instead of trying to find out what exactly Sasuke was reacting to first.

"Ah!" Naruto exclaimed, watching with glee the twitch of Sasuke's eye, the fast, sudden whiplash of Sakura's head, and the radiating approval from his sensei. "Sorry I'm late. I had to get some groceries, and then I had to walk the dog, and a little bit after that, there was this burning orphanage that was across from a balloon stand, and I said to myself..." He trailed off meaningfully, glancing at Kakashi with a smirk.

Kakashi was _beaming_.

"A plus, Naruto! Very, very good!" The (freakishly) tall man inclined his head once, then again, and Naruto finally realized that his sensei was checking him out. "And your clothes?" He asked, walking around Naruto to get the full effect. He pulled at the strap of the courier's bag, poked the criss-crossing straps on his arms, and pulled out the windsock-hood. It fell back with a metallic "cling", and Kakashi stepped back around, standing between Sakura and Sasuke.

He clapped.

"Hidden weapons. Indistinguishable civilian gear with hidden padding. Extra fabric for bandages, no unnessary ribbons or trailing fabric, and no metallic objects." He paused. "The goggles?" The instructor's tone was something either curious or careful, and Naruto couldn't distinguish them.

"Had them since I was a kid. Used 'em all the time the academy." As a headband, he added to himself. He ran fingers through his unusually spikey hair, watching Kakashi's eyes focus on them.

"Ah, I see. Your hair, then?" His tone this time was venturing, and definitely bordering on caution.

"Combed it." Naruto shrugged, and Sasuke twitched again. Sakura's jaw had just begun to work robotically, one hand theatrically pointed his way.

"Aah." Kakashi stopped. "I must say, I'm completely impressed." He smirked behind the mask, and his eyes connected with Naruto's. "Again, very, very good."

"Your jumpsuit!" Sakura bursted out, panting after the words. "Where...how...when..." She stopped, instantly straightening. "When the hell did you get here?!"

Sasuke said nothing, but he'd turned away, jaw still trembling. Naruto watched one extremely pale hand run through extremely dark hair, and cheerfully scratched the back of his own head. He hummed for a moment, enjoying every subtle twitch on Sakura's face, and startled. "Ah! Well, I guess I got here at about ten-"

"In the MORNING?" Sakura looked like she was ready to fall off the edge of the bridge. Sasuke had turned his head, his eyes widening again of their own accord. Even Kakashi had lowered his book and raised his eyebrow to look at him.

"Well, yeah. I stayed for a few hours, got bored, wandered around, and then, you know," and he gestured off into the distance, "orphans."

Kakashi snickered.

"Anyway, when I was done them, I came back here at," he shrugged, "about four." Naruto didn't think he would ever forget the way that Kakashi glanced at him in that moment.

The complete lack of sound couldn't be described with a single word like "silence", or "pause", instead leaning towards phrases like "complete vacuum" and "as quiet as rocks were old".

He continued. "Anyway, the jumpsuit?" Despite themselves, all three of his team mates (he included Kakashi because frankly, the man looked so _young_ all of the sudden), leaned forward, eagerly turning an ear towards him. Sakura actually licked her lips. "Laundry day."

To his sensei's credit, only Sakura and Sasuke actually face-vaulted. The jonin only stumbled, and instantly regained his balance, coughing unconvincingly.

Sakura picked herself off the ground. "Laundry day? Come on Kakashi-sensei - he _has_ to be an imposter, a henge, or a clone. Honestly, when was the last time Naruto actually washed that jumpsuit?"

Naruto paused, sucking his check as he earnestly struggled to remember. Kakashi sweatdropped. "Point taken, Sakura. Well," he said, and advanced towards Naruto, "sorry about this." The older man pressed him against the high wall of the bridge, wedging his own body between Sakura and Sasuke, and preventing them from actually seeing Naruto.

Naruto's eyes widened as he felt the chakra gather around Kakashi's hand, and he opened his mouth to explain that, no, he wasn't a clone, when Kakashi used one hand to form seals. "Konoha Special Attack! Tickle no Jutsu!"

The jonin slammed one hand into the railing, harmlessly displacing a small burst of bright, blue light as the other hand whipped under Naruto's sweatshirt and undershirts, bolting past the padding, until his bare flesh was exposed. In an instant, Kakashi's other hand was teasing the area around his navel, and despite himself, Naruto couldn't help but start giggling. He could hear, almost distantly, bitter snorts from Sasuke and incomprehesible protests from Sakura. Kakashi's hand suddenly felt warm, and Naruto stopped giggling immediately as he saw Kakashi's gaze focus on the spreading black lines inked on his stomach. Kakashi let the sweatshirt drop.

"Yep, it's Naruto." The Jonin pulled out his book again. "Real deal and all. Only the real Naruto is that ticklish." He glanced at the other two genin, "And you certainly shouldn't use that as an advantage if you need to, because my goodness, what sort of ninja would we be if we actually remembered people's weaknesses?" The silver-haired man shook his head. "But, laundry day?" He cocked his head back at Naruto. "Another A plus. Scent is an important resource for a shinobi, and it's wise for them to know exactly what it does." For a moment, Naruto thought it was ludicrous that Kakashi was lecturing _him_ on what scents could do, when Naruto could tell what Kakashi had eaten for dinner two weeks ago. (Spaghetti, and Kakashi ate it with two cloves of garlic). "The Aburame Clan's bugs track each other through scent, and the Inuzuka's fighting style is based around the high abilities of not just their hounds, but their own, eh, "family quirks". The fact that _Sakura_ could track your old jumpsuit if it had been buried in a mineshaft is _not_ an advantage on missions."

"H_ey!" _He found himself chorusing with Sakura, "What the hell do you mean by that?"

"Anyway," Kakashi said dismissively, his other hand reaching into another vest pocket, "Special training today!"

Naruto eagerly leaned forward, "It usually takes years for this, but you guys are super-special." Naruto began to feel a heavy dread sink over him. "In fact, you're so super-special, I don't think I actually need to be there for this." He threw a white envelope in the center of the group, and Naurto's hand reached up to grab it. Kakashi nodded. "Anyway, I have errands. See, that orphanage that burned down? It needs some help rebuilding and I..."

"Oh, just leave already!" Sakura yelled, growling in a much more impressive manner than either Kiba or Akamaru had ever managed.

"Right." The Jonin nodded once. "Training details are inside. You have one hour." He was halfway down the bridge before he waved with one hand. "Good luck!"

The three genin stood in silence for a moment. Naruto stared at the evil white envelope, Sakura was still glancing at Naruto and shaking her head in wonder, and Sasuke was staring at the water, his head jerking in Naruto's direction every few moments, then jerking back as soon as his eyes met Naruto's.

"Well," Naruto started, breaking the silence suddenly, "Let's see what our training is." He opened the envelope, and Sasuke came from behind him to watch over one shoulder, as Sakura mimiced him over the other. "Official request from the Hokage's Tower. Form D-873. Mission permeters..." He only read two sentences into it before jerking his head upwards, growling under his breath. He shoved the paper into Sakura's hands and ran halfway down the bridge. "Kakashi! You _bastard! _This isn't training! This is _trash duty_."

* * *

Okay. I wrote 12,800 words of this in two days. Do you have any idea how completely insane it is that this chapter is this long? I believe that this chapter is longer than my first three added together. 

Anyway, I was planning on cutting this off at around the 5K mark, and there was even a nice opportunity there. Then, I was going to cut it off at the 9K mark or so, where there was also an opportunity. But, I _promised_ that I would have some Team Seven interaction in here, and because of that, I'm _never promising anything for you again_.

It sounds mean, but honestly, I had to write THIRTEEN THOUSAND WORDS to get to the point where Team Seven actually met up.

Anyway, I'd love comments on all that went wrong with this chapter. If you find spelling errors, sentences that are in the wrong tense, or things that just don't add up with what I've said before, drop me a line. Same thing with OCs, characters acting out-of-character, and stuff like that. Tell me how I did with some of the cliches in this chapter.

So, thanks for all the reviews so far - it's seriously been awesome to see what you guys write - and I hope you enjoy reading this chapter.

PS. I _ told_ you that my chapters were getting longer and longer. Ha! I was right!


	9. Acts of Devotion

Chapter 9

There were a great number of things that Naruto admired about Sakura. Her beautiful eyes were the color of the chopped chives in ramen, her long silky hair the color of the swirls in fish cakes found in the bottom of ramen bowls, and she had a gentle, kind-hearted nature that Naruto had yearned for all his life. The last of these was never more evident in it's complete and utter absence as her fist clenched around what remained of the mission statement.

"'Special Training" my ass! If he had errands, I'll just eat my hitai-ite. Kakashi-sensei was just too lazy to even be here! I'll tear him to..." she trailed off, her head whipping around to focus on Naruto. "What are _you_ looking at?"

"Nothing! Nope, I didn't see anything!" Naruto quickly ducked his head down. He wasn't a coward, and he might have been an idiot, but it would take a particularly suicidal rock not to feel her battle aura.

"Mission parameters?" Sasuke interjected coolly, his voice making Sakura whip her head around again.

"Ah! Yes!" Sakura swiftly uncrumpled the knotted envelope, and she only seemed to glance at it for a minute before turning back to Sasuke. "Naruto was right - it _is_ trash duty. It was supposed to be an all-day mission, but because Kakashi-sensei showed up late..."

Naruto choked, spinning around sharply to hide the half-hysterical laughter. "S-sorry. Frog in my throat." He coughed unconvincingly, but no one called him up on it.

"Right." Sakura continued dryly. "Anyway, we have an hour. The location is the "Hokage Memorial Park", somewhere in H-sector, and it's Rank E."

"'E"." Sasuke repeated. Naruto believed that because there were eyes that could see through illusions, eyes that could copy techniques, eyes that could see through walls, and eyes that could see the very chakra of a person, there had to be, somewhere, eyes that could kill with a single glance. If such eyes didn't exist, Naruto believed that Sasuke would successfully develop the techniques needed within the decade, because his eyes were halfway there already. "He gave us an E-mission." He turned to glance at Naruto. "This is all your fault."

"Huh?" Naruto startled, twisting around to look at the Uchiha. "How the hell is this my fault?"

"I graduated at the top of the class. Sakura," and he glanced at the kunoichi, who seemed exactly three steps away from latching onto his chest at the mention of her name, "was the top kunoichi in her class. You, idiot, were the last in class. It is because of _you_ that we are slated for D-missions. This E-mission is the final indignity."

"Oh, you can just go to hell! It's only because of me that we managed to get that mission with Zabuza!" The Kyuubi vessel snarled, stomping over to the dark haired boy, leaning only inches from the other's face. "You bitch and whine about missions and crap, and then you complain how Kakashi doesn't train you, and then you bitch and whine about how freaking important you are because you were top of the class. Well, guess what," and he narrowed his eyes, wishing that he had a box to stand on because he was only staring at Sasuke's highly raised chin, "we're not in the Academy anymore. So what if you were the top ninja in your class. I'm sure whatever asshole you piss off the next time is gonna feel real bad about killing you. You might bitch that these missions are holding you back. You might bitch that Kakashi is holding you back. Hell, you can bitch all you want about _me_ holding you back. Honestly," and the blond spat at his feet, "your prissy attitude is the only thing that's screwing up your life. Stoping blaming it all on everyone else."

Sasuke stopped breathing, and Naruto felt the air chill. "Guys?" Naruto turned his head to watch Sakura as she stepped forward. She came to within a few feet of the pair before spreading her arms in the international gesture of time outs. "We have a mission. Sasuke, you can kill Naruto after it's done, alright?" Sasuke continued to glare.

Naruto began to growl, but one glance at Sakura's expression quieted him. She looked_ scared_.

"Yeah, sure." Naruto twisted away from Sasuke. "I remember the last time I nearly kicked your ass. Didn't end well."

"Oh? When did this happen - in your dreams?" The Uchiha mocked.

"Lame line, bastard. Nope, I'm talking about the day after we graduated." Naruto shuddered.

"Oh god. You mean... that." The disgust in Sasuke's voice was palpable. "You _didn't_ "nearly kick my ass", but ...well, yeah, it didn't end well." Naruto could hear Sasuke exhale. "Right. Mission."

"There's a park in H-district I used to go to as a kid..." Naruto began, and Sakura looked at him gratefully. He tried to decide exactly why her eyes were shining like that. It could've been gratitude, could've been admiration, and it could've been love. With a rueful shake of his head, he realized that it probably_ was _gratitude that she didn't need to explain bloodstains on the bridge.

After some initial confusion (because, as it turned out, there were three "Hokage Memorial Parks" within a three mile radius of their actual destination) they found the right one, a small hill that looked like nothing more than an alcove of trees covered in confetti, paper plates, and silly string in the tragic aftermath of a children's birthday party gone wrong for everyone but the birthday child.

Aside from the ribbons wound tightly around tree branches, silly hats decorating small, filthy shrines, noisemakers hanging from the branches like the most torturous wind chimes in history, and idly thrown wrapping paper carpeting the forest's floor, there was a small lake the color of thick, cooling tar surrounding a statue that was so caked in mud, leaves, and what _might_ have been the collected nests of a thousand generations of pigeons that it looked less like something man made and more like that man, despite the best efforts of chisels, jutsu, and strategically placed dynamite, couldn't get out of the way.

The shock lasted less than a minute, and the screams lasted five. Sasuke sharply broke their outraged cries by picking up a large, pointed pike (and, a bright orange and yellow safety vest that neither Naruto nor Sakura could say anything about for fear of being stabbed by said large, pointed pike), and hurling it at the largest piece of trash.

"The last one," he spoke so quietly that Naruto had to shut up to hear him (as Sakura had the habit of going completely still whenever he opened his mouth), "to clear this place out owes the others lunch." He had glance upwards, his eyes cold, full of a promise often fulfilled - the threat of pain. "Naruto."

"Heh, you're on, you bastard. Rules?" The blond smirked. The challenge inside of Sasuke's eyes wasn't just familiar, but welcome. It was as if the moment on the bridge, where he'd said things that he'd only thought, and never even pondered saying aloud came out into the air, had left completely, the moment long gone. The ritual was a challenge, a competition, and in the same breath, a neutral ground in a way that no one else would ever be able to understand. He lazily stretched his hands behind his head, one eye noting stray pieces of white paper fluttering in the high, thickly leaved branches.

"You wasted our time earlier with your," and the dark haired boy spat the next word, "antics earlier. Thirty minute time limit, the rest of the hour will be spent filling out the mission reports."

Naruto laughed. "I bet I can fill out that paperwork _and_ get more trash than you, no problem."He turned his head to Sakura. "You in?"

She glanced at him shrewdly, and turned one eye to Sasuke. "There aren't any technique bans in the contest?" The Uchiha shrugged, and Sakura nodded. She leaned in close to Naruto, and the blond felt his heart flutter. There was a look of utter and complete understanding in her eyes. She _knew_ just as surely as he did. "You're not going to lose."

Her confidence in him made his heart pound all the way out of his chest. His breathing shallowed, and all he could do was stare at the way her lips were parted, a small smile tugging at the sides of them. "Sasuke," she continued, "is going to lose." She paused. "To you." She stopped completely for a moment, then she shook her head, her long pink hair flying everywhere. "My god, that's the strangest thing to happen in Konoha since Maito Gai."

"Oh," Naruto interrupted, "You know him too? I just found him walking through the market on his hands a few times. How did you...?" He trailed off, and Sakura sighed.

"My mother's related to him."

There was a great pause.

"My god, I'm so sorry, Sakura-chan." He moved in to clutch her in a great embrace. Seconds later, he was kissing dirt. Idly, he wondered if he should have asked her if she wanted a hug _before_ moving in for the kill.

"Anyway," she said, flexing her arm and gradually unclenching her fist, "You're not going to lose." She glanced back, and Naruto saw that Sasuke was standing a few feet away, his head turned, body facing the tar-lake. His posture screamed that he wasn't paying attention to what they were saying, so it went without mentioning that he really was. "When Sasuke loses," and she only hesitated a little after saying that, "He'll take me out for dinner. So! Do your best, Naruto!"

Naruto didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

"Okay, Sasuke. Let's do this" The brunette looked back at him lazily, one hand on his pike, looking sober and refined (save for the bright yellow and orange reflective vest, which made him look like he was wearing Naruto around his chest). The Uchiha nodded, and Naruto grinned at Sakura. "Wanna count it down?" He asked, and he felt like he could conquer the world because this was the _second_ smile that was meant just for him that he got today.

"Right! On the count of three. One..." Sasuke spared Naruto a quick glance, and broke it off with a dismissive snort. Naruto tensed. "Two..." Sasuke dug his heels into the ground, fingers of one hand twitching to form seals. Naruto smirked. "Three!"

With one stance, one hand symbol, and one muted phrase, the small clearing filled with a multitude of orange and yellow, as if the entire hill caught aflame. Naruto had been somewhat pleased to note that several of his clones had been wearing the white sweatshirt outfit he'd donned today, though he still had no clue why. He felt the prod of the edge of his notebook in his side, and made a mental note to jot that fact down the next time his teammates weren't paying attention. His clones turned to glance at him, and he gestured with two lazy fingers around the hill. "Cleaning time! First one to finish gets to eat ramen!"

There was a deafening chorus of cheers, and at once, more than a dozen Naruto clones darted past Sasuke, some already bounding through the trees as others grabbed spare pikes, and others still readied trash bags.

"I hate you, Uzumaki." The Uchiha's glare had to be one of the most beautiful things Naruto had ever seen. One of the Uchiha Prodigy's hands was clenching around the pike, the other clenching into a fist at his side. He took small steps to Naruto, his eyes darting to the rushing clones that zoomed around the three genin. He came within arms reach of Naruto, and haltingly, almost robotically raised his arm. Naruto waited. And waited.

"Good show." Sasuke's hand was raised, and Naruto could do nothing but slap it. The Uchiha's eyebrow rose, and Naruto realized too late that it was supposed to be a handshake, not a high five.

"Damn right it was a good show!" He glanced around at his clones. "They do good work, so this place'll be spotless and all." Cheery, passing by, beamed with a fox grin, bogged down with two bags of trash already. "Anyway, how'd you know what I was gonna do, Sakura-chan?"

She twisted her head, looking for all the world disenchanted with the scene. Sasuke winced at the familiar pose, and Naruto snickered. "Come on, Naruto. It's not like you ever use any other jutsu. We had an unreasonable time limit for the amount of work needed." She paused, and there was a small, sincere, _real_ smile on her face. "I would've done the same thing as you."

The smartest kunoichi in the class praising him. Uchiha raising his hand in defeat. Kakashi clapping. He had a grandmother, an aunt, and a name for his father.

It might very well have been the best day of his life for the second day in a row.

He couldn't help the grin that grew across his face, and he heard Sasuke cross his arms. He turned, and Sakura was watching his clones pass by, confusion slowly dawning on her features. "Hey," he began, watching both of them look at him briefly, "Sasuke. Why'd you give up so easily? It doesn't seem like you."

"Hn." The prodigy threw his head back. "I didn't lose to you. I ended the contest early." He paused. "It _was_ a good show." The brunette turned his shoulder towards the blond. 'Besides, you stated you were going to do the paperwork. Even the price of feeding your huge gullet is worth not having to do that."

The Uchiha launched himself into the treetops, and a few passing Naruto clones stopped momentarily to stare (or, more accurately, "glare") at him. Sakura watched Naruto's grin slowly darken, blonde eyebrows drawing together. "You'd better get on that paperwork, Na-ru-to-kun." She teased, her finger wagging on every syllable of his name. She walked off, pausing as she spotted Cheery, who was happily washing a particularly dirty statue of a chubby, smiling man who looked like the first Akimichi.

Naruto watched her leave, watched the branches bend under Sasuke's weight as he attempted to boss a few of his clones around. He frowned, but the anger that had oozed into him seconds before - the same tart-tasting anger from the bridge - had gone away, back to where ever the hell it came from in the first place.

He glanced around again, and moved to a picnic table that was already cleared off by several of his clones. "Hey," he began, patting one Naruto in the back, "Have you seen Foreman?"

The clone snorted. "You'd know where he'd be better than me. I just got here five minutes ago." The Original frowned, and the clone waved his hands in front of himself. "Geez, don't get pissy about it. I just meant that, well, can't you track him or something? I wasn't there at the library - you just made me, after all - but, well, maybe he still is?"

The Kyuubi-vessel puckered his lips. "Huh. When you say that you were just created..." and he paused, making the clone cock his head in wonder, "what do you mean? Aren't the same group of Bunshins being ...eh, "recycled" every time I pull out the jutsu?"

The clone snorted. "Hell if I know. I've woken up in the middle of fights a couple of times, but that's about it." The clone stopped. "Hey, boss. Do you think that this counts as talking to yourself? It's kinda like you have multiple personalities, but multiple bodies to show for it sometimes. How crazy are you, anyway?"

"Don't you have a job to do?" Naruto asked, watching the clone flinch away from his tone.

"Yeah, yeah. But, well, if you have questions, it's not like any of your clones'll know something you don't. I mean, we're all created the same way that you were when you made us, body, mind, and all that stuff. ...well, except for Glasses. Who the hell knows what he really has going on inside of him." There was a pause. "Well, I mean, except for that stick we all know is up his -"

"Work."

"Geez! You're pissy today. It's not like I'm gonna get the ramen, anyway. I mean, how will you know which of us cleans the most? It's not like you assigned us sectors or nothing. Hell, if you look hard enough, I bet a couple of us are hiding under bushes."

"Whoa. You actually have a point." The original blond paused. "Well, pass it around that ...uh... geez. I'm gonna poof anyone that I catch lazing around. Oh! I got it! How about a contest! Yeah, a competition! The rules are that this place has to be clean at the end, otherwise _no one_ is getting Ramen. But, well, you guys can poof each other, or work in teams, or any crap like that. Do whatever you need to do to do as much work, and poof out the other guys as you can."

"...geez." The clone crossed his arms over his head. "You have a lot of issues. I mean, having your personalities do the work for you and then destroy each other? Lazy 'n' crazy like the bastard kid of a Nara and Uchiha."

There was a sharp exploding sound, and seconds later, a dissipating cloud of smoke. "...Why are so many of me complete jerks?" The blonde shook his head quickly, exhaled, and called over to Cheery. "Hey! Got an errand for you!".

"Yeah, boss?" Cheery was identical to the other Orange-suit Naruto's in every way except for the silly smile plastered on his face, and the fact that, five minutes into waxing a fat statue, he was already absolutely filthy. His hair was ruffled, there were smears of mud on both cheeks, his forehead, and somehow, the back of his neck. One pant leg even looked torn, and there was something resembling a chain of ivy around one of his ankles. Cheery seemed completely unaware of it as he eagerly looked forward into his creator's eyes with the exact same expression Naruto had sometimes seen in the eyes of small toddlers and particularly excitable, small, yappy dogs. "What'cha got for me? Something fun, right? Oh man, I bet it's gonna be awesome! And, like, full of something neat like explosions or saving Sakura-chan from pirates, or something like that! Right?"

"Er, yeah. Something like that..."

* * *

The clearing looked like a completely different area of the forest, and Naruto couldn't help but feel a sense of pride that he - or, as it was, _parts_ of him - had done most, if not all of it. It was a sense of accomplishment that he normally felt directly after his pranks and just before he got caught, and he wondered if part of the glee he felt came from the fact that all _he_ had really needed to do was paperwork. 

Truth be told, Naruto didn't exactly like having his clones do the work for him. Having his clones help out in battle was completely different than having his clones clean for him because technically, his clones _were_ copies of him, and Naruto knew for a fact that he didn't mind battles, but really hated cleaning. As such, it seemed unfair to make himself work when he himself didn't want to.

Thoughts like that, however, always managed to twist his mind into knots, and it always took ages to get his train of thought back onto something that resembled a straight path, even when that straight path inevitably led off yet another cliff.

He knew that none of his clones (well, except for the one that Cheery had been standing on) particularly resented the fact that yesterday, he'd used to them sort through the BIRCH office. That had been for Ramen - which they'd all tasted later on because _he'd_ tasted it- and for Makoto and Haruka. He would've sorted through all the papers alone if he would've had time, and part of him calmed down when he realized the same thing applied today. If Glasses were here, he probably would've taken the paperwork, and Naruto would've been cleaning along side his other selves.

Naruto wondered for a moment, and sent out thin threads of chakra from his body. They immediately went taut, locating about two dozen clones in varying locations around the park, stretching out into the village, and a few were even in the far forests at the edge of town. He didn't know exactly just what he wanted to do, or even how to do it, but Naruto knew the end result he wanted. Concentrating, he sat down his pen and fanned out his fingers under the picnic table. He closed his eyes, and found his lips silently following his thoughts. He pictured Glasses, remembering the way he translated the Fire Lord's Book of Law (and Torture), the way that he dominated an entire table in the library with books and parchment, and then the clone's neat, precise script. He felt his own rope-like chakra protrude out, drifting in front of him lazily, searching for something to attach to. Carefully, he glued it to his memories of Glasses, and _felt_ it.

Glasses was inside of his mind and suddenly, so was he.

It was a strange sensation, because as soon as Naruto knew (which was immediately), he was standing in front of the clone in much the same way that one could "stand" in the center of a jell-o mold. That is to say, there was very little standing going on, massive confusion, and a great sense of being out of place.

Naruto couldn't breathe, couldn't move, and couldn't do anything but look at his clone who, inside of his own (their own?) mind was dressed in a strange robe that almost looked like a karate outfit, but it was colored in a deep shade that was twisted between purple and black. True to his name, inside of his/their/Naruto's mind, Glasses did wear some, a thick square-shaped pair that made him look intelligent, older, and thirty percent more arrogant than before.

Glasses glanced at him once, then twice, and then shook his head in disgust. "You," he said, and somehow, his clone's voice didn't sound anything like his own, older, more proper, and accented with contempt, "shouldn't be here." There was a great pause, and Naruto felt his limbs sluggishly respond, and he could feel his chest break open as if his ribs were a treasure chest that someone just unlocked for the first time.

"You're not supposed to be here." Glasses continued, and somehow, the clone _walked_ over to the Original, footsteps steady and unerring. He was close enough that Naruto would've felt his breath if the two had been anywhere but inside of thought, if Glasses was actually breathing. The clone stared deeply into Naruto's eyes, frowning at what he found. "You're not ready."

Naruto saw, rather than "felt", Glasses' arm move towards his stomach. It wasn't until he saw a red corona reflected in his clone's lens that he realized what the clone was touching.

The seal.

Panic surged through Naruto, because even if Glasses was still a part of Naruto, even if Glasses had nothing but good intentions (and, despite meeting him only twice, even Naruto knew better), Naruto knew for a fact that the seal was _off limits._

"Come back when you're ready." The clone intoned before Naruto could even begin to flail. "Also," and the clone began backing away, his footsteps just as steady and straight backwards as they were forwards, his eyes never leaving Naruto's, "there's no "d" in "objective", and there's a run on sentence in your third answer."

Naruto opened his eyes - his _own_ eyes - and he was quite certain that he was the one doing it. Underneath the table, his fingers flexed, and he didn't realize how badly he needed air until he began breathing it. It burned his throat, just like how it felt when he ate something incredibly spicy, and for the rest of the day, even milk hurt it.

He glanced around, trying to focus his thoughts on not focusing anymore because it seemed that actually concentrating would just lead to trouble.

Sasuke was in the trees, using Secret Uchiha Ninjutsu to remove long trails of silly string from the high branches and Sakura was taking care of the stray bits of trash that had hidden themselves beneath bushes, under rocks, and inside of tree hollows in an attempt to survive the Great Cleansing. He reluctantly sensed his clones concentrating themselves around the small pond, and he wondered if, or exactly _how_, it was supposed to be cleaned.

He exhaled deeply, and picked up his pencil again and began to write, carefully erasing a spare "d" only because _he_ found it and no one else. It was generally silent, except for Sakura's occasionally punctuated promises of pain as she jabbed something pointy, filthy, and very, very threatening into nearby pieces of trash, Sasuke's "gleeful" bounding through the treetops, and the scratch of pencil on paper. His clones were muttering to themselves, but that was out of (normal) earshot. The contrast to his previous missions - where he and Sasuke argued, he and Sakura argued, and he would get beat up by one or both - was shocking.

Under the paper plates, confetti, party favors, and layers of pulled off and terrorized leaves (because, as it turned out, the arch nemesis of Konoha's forests weren't shinobi, as Naruto had always figured, but small children who liked destroy things, which, of course, referred to all of them.), there was fresh, shoots of dark grass, and the trees actually looked healthier when they weren't coated in plastic. A few clones ambled by, coated from toes to nose in something dark brown, shooting dark looks at Sakura, the spotlessly clean fat statue wearing a party hat, and even the Original Naruto as they passed by with something resembling buckets full of yet _more_ dark brown muck.

Naruto paused, sucked in his breath, and concentrated again, this time focusing on what exactly he'd learned in the last few minutes. Only one clone had dissipated in that time, and there was actually no pain involved in his memory dissipation because he actually hadn't learned anything from working in three feet of tar muck. Naruto learned that one clone with a noble posture and a certain familiar charisma had gathered the others in an attempt to clean out the pond. So far, they'd excavated about three layers, and they'd hit rock at eight feet. The clones carrying muck were ferrying it out of the forest and Naruto had a sudden understanding as to why some of his clones felt like they were as far away as the Hyuuga Compound because, as it turned out, they _were_ in the Hyuuga compound.

In their excavations, they'd found four different layers of colored muck, each with tiny odds and ends in them. The top most layer was full of sandals and boots, the layer after that full of glasses, while at the very bottom, what had to be a couple hundred dollars in ancient looking coins were slowly being pulled out and cleaned.

The statue in the center turned out to be very pretty, after they took off three feet of "protective coating". It was a beautiful woman with sad looking eyes, holding an open umbrella in the crook of one arm, while her hands were occupied with a pitcher that was supposed to be pouring water. After massive jerry-rigging, fiddling, and (oddly enough), electrocution, the clones had actually managed to get fresh water out of the statue. Naruto assumed it was spring water, but decided that he didn't want to test his theory until the water in the pool didn't resemble liquorice.

Aside from that, the bushes had been trimmed, their branches and spare leaves bagged and sorted into compost piles. The plastics had been thrown into recycling, and the same went for the scattered glass bottles, ceramic sake containers, and rusted, abandoned shuriken. Most of the clones were staying away from Sakura because, while it was fantastic to work beside her, it was less appealing when she had something pointy in her hands. Besides, the clones noticed that she slowed, or even stopped, what she was doing to watch them work, and that wasn't helping anyone.

He glanced back at the paper, smirked, and finished one last line on the final paragraph, then signed his name on one last dotted line, his signature only drifting off the assigned blank by five letters. He glanced over to his pink-haired team mate with relief, leaning back and cracking his fingers.

"Hey! Sakura-chan! What's the time again?"

"Five minutes later than it was the last time you asked, dummy." There was a rustle, from the bushes across from the picnic tables, and then a pause. "About forty five minutes after the hour." Sakura stepped out, pulling stray leaves from her hair and then brushing off an excess of what Naruto knew were small, painful spiked seeds of doom that attached themselves to clothing and never let go. She glanced at Naruto, and he felt his stomach fizzle and flop in strange new ways as her eyebrows raised. "You're finished already?" She glanced at her watch, shaking her arm. "You really _did_ fill those out quickly."

There was a pause.

"Wait, do you even know how to fill out paperwork? Oh god - what have I done?! The paper's probably written in code, with tiny illustrations in the margins, and I'll have to fix it all. Please, please tell me you've filled out paperwork - _properly - _ before." She was pleading at the end of it, and despite himself, Naruto sweatdropped, shifting his hands just so that one of the less wrinkled forms covered the back side of the last page, which had a large panel of comics that would prove her point and cause him great, horrible pain because of it.

"Well, yeah. I mean, Kakashi even let me fill out his tax forms yesterday." Naruto remembered with a wince that particular fact, and mentally shuddered from the trauma.

Kakashi's tax forms were some of the most horrifying documentation he'd ever seen. It wasn't just the fact that Kakashi waited four years to do the last five year's worth of taxes, or the fact that large portions of his income had been allocated to weapons, armor, medical supplies, and five other categories that were censored and marked "classified". It might of had something to do with the way that Kakashi organized his paperwork, a system that might of made sense to a one eyed savant who could read the jonin's thick, scrawling script (which could've been cursive, could've been sloppy print, could've been a high, secret ninja code, and could've just been to spite whoever did his paperwork), but more than likely only made sense to Kakashi himself (when he was drunk).

What was certain about Kakashi's paperwork was the fact that it would haunt him for the rest of his life. To decode it, he'd had to devote four bunshin to translating the paper, scrambling through the dictionary, and frantically searching through the "Rules and Regulations, BIRCH branch, Konoha v.2.0.4 (d)" for information on how to actually _do_ taxes, and comparing the forms to the returns of the other Jonin instructors. Sadly, he remembered all of it.

Despite the fact that the man was obviously insane, despite his horrible hairstyle and sense of fashion, and despite the fact that he was knowingly passing his madness onto the next generation of ninja, Naruto had a deep, lasting admiration of Maito Gai. Out of all the jonin instructors in nearly thirty years of paperwork, there was no disputing the fact that Maito Gai had the neatest handwriting, the easiest ledgers, and the most sensible allocations of funds. Gai's income was divided neatly into "Training", "Living Needs", and "Mission Supplies", of which Konohagakure reimbursed for two.

The Kyuubi-vessel doubted anyone else in Konoha knew it (including Gai himself), but the leotard-clad madman was easily the richest Jonin in the entire village. Kurenai had a modest savings, having inherited a house from merchant parents as a young chuunin. The Sandaime's son lived with his father, but wasted a lot of his money on his various addictions (which were in no way limited to just gambling and cigarettes), and Kakashi's ledger spoke for itself, though "spoke" wasn't quite as accurate as "wept in darkness bemoaning it's own existence."

Naruto shook his head. "Ugh, yeah. I've done taxes, mission reports, inventory lists, and damage statements, on top of looking through genin evaluations, academy reports, and that final report from the Fish and Game Committee's study on how chakra effects young fish."

Sakura paused. "Wait, how would chakra get near the fish?" She stopped, and Naruto saw a light shining behind her eyes, her features gradually morphing into surprise, wonder, than understanding. "Tree walking."

Naruto paused. "Uh, Sakura-chan? I don't know what part of the forest you've been in, but I gotta say that I've never seen a fish in a -" He was cut off by a sharp look from his team mate.

"No, dummy! Tree-walking! Remember when we were training on it, and Kakashi said that it built up chakra control and reserves? Remember how, to make it work, our chakra is actually touching the tree? What if we could do the same thing with water...?" she trailed off, and Naruto heard her mutter something like "Fish walking?". He blinked.

"Okay, so if fish live in water...we'd need to be touching fish to get chakra into them?" Sakura stood straighter in that moment. "...Couldn't we just touch the water? I mean, does chakra disperse like that, or does it just go straight through like, uh, an arrow?" He sucked his lip, his hands reaching for the notebook at his side. He stopped, seeing Sakura watching his movements, but shrugged and fetched it anyway. His hands sketched "Tree - Fish - Water - Arrow?", with a line connecting it to "Chakra?". Quickly, he hid it away, his hands bumping through the spare trip wire, linen-wrapped shuriken, and a large, paper-wrapped bag he'd completely forgotten about.

His stomach gurgled, and several clones stopped. One even ducked into the bushes and covered his head, assuming the classic "Exploding Tag! We're all gonna die!" posture. Naruto laughed nervously.

"Eh, hey! Guys!" More clones stopped, and Sakura looked at Naruto oddly. "I mean, Sakura and Bastard!" There was a rustling the trees above them, and Naruto could swear it sounded threatening. "Wanna have lunch with me?"

Sakura tapped her watch with one finger. "I don't think we really have time for that. I mean, in the time it'll take for us to get to the Hokage's tower to submit the reports..." She trailed off as a white-clothed Naruto snatched the papers from Naruto's extended hand, leaping past the bushes in less time than it took to blink. Naruto smirked, and Sakura frowned. "Well, I mean, I only brought a small lunch..."

Naruto waved her off. "Eh, I have a feeling I packed enough for all of us." He glanced up, and Sasuke was crouched on a thin, branch above them, frowning even further than usual. "And don't you dare say that this cooking isn't good enough for you, because I'll just kick your ass."

Sasuke scowled, leaping from the tree with a modest three sumersaults and a half-turn, landing on the ground with no sound and only a small displacement of dust. "I'm in no mood for ramen today."

Sakura pouted. "I thought Sasuke was taking me...I mean "us"...out to dinner!" She glanced towards Sasuke, and Naruto felt something twist inside of his stomach because her gaze screamed that she was hungry for something, and it sure wasn't food.

Naruto's glance was drawn towards the small jerk of Sasuke's hand. For anyone else, it would've been dismissed as reflex, but for the Uchiha, there were no reflexes. Naruto had seen, on the rare few occasions that the three of them had gone out to dinner before, that Sasuke kept his money in a fashionable leather wallet, kept in the same pocket as he was reaching for. "Hey," he started, and Sakura and Sasuke both glanced his way. "What day is it today?"

Sakura paused. "Tuesday. The twelfth," she continued at Naruto's continued glance. "You know, despite the fact that you claimed experience doing paperwork, the fact that you don't know what day it is really isn't a huge confidence builder.'

Naruto ignored her. He knew exactly what that small mote of worry lurking in Sasuke's eye was as he had often seen it in his own, and he knew sympathy (because Sasuke would _kill_ him if he called it "pity") for the last Uchiha.

There were many funds in Konoha. The Shinobi Widow's Fund (which had Widowers in it, too), The Scholarship for Shinobi Excellence, for civilians with low-incomes but high-potential children, the Kyuubi Relief Fund, and the War Orphans's Bi-Weekly. There were dozens of others, hidden in the cracks of bureaucracy, and Naruto realized with something like awe and something like horror that he now knew them all.

Naruto had always heard that the Uchiha had been an influential clan in Konoha, a fact that was still in evidence because even _one_ Uchiha was enough to send council elders into fits about custody, education, and usage. Naruto wasn't immune to the fact that he'd gotten even icier glares from select village Elders after his team's members had been announced, and no one and nothing could change the mind of the Hokage, who had approved his team himself. There was a great deal of speculation about how the Kyuubi-vessel would corrupt the Last Uchiha, and Naruto had picked most of it up through eavesdropped conversations and a small bit of direct confrontation.

So far, the most he'd managed to "corrupt" Sasuke with was a kiss (which still repeated in his nightmares at least once a week), a brief lesson on hocking loogies over the balconies of the Hokage's Tower, and a quicker way to set trip wires around camp, a method that the blond had refined in his early pranking days.

Naruto had tried other times to "connect" (because "bond" seemed like such a creepy way to put it) with the Uchiha, but there had always existed something like a wall between them, and Naruto truly couldn't figure out if that was a good thing or not. On one hand, Sasuke did nothing but degrade his abilities, mock his weaknesses, distract Sakura-chan from seeing Naruto's incredible feats of manliness, and serve as the poster boy for stuck up, arrogant, over-powered brats. On the other hand, Sasuke was his team mate, and though he honestly couldn't remember who he heard say it, one quote stuck in his mind.

"Your team will be your family."

He and Sasuke were, despite all the differences in their lives, very much alike. They were orphans, though Sasuke's family was killed off later on, and Naruto just got some of his back. They were separated from the rest of the village, Sasuke because of his "potential", and Naruto for his lack of it. They struggled for their own recognition, battled for their own talents to be called out, and each had a goal that they would give their life to achieve (though, frankly, dying to become Hokage would give Naruto a very short reign). Both he and Sasuke, apparently, were also incredibly broke between the seventh and the twenty first of each month.

It had something to do with bureaucracy, and something to do with the lousy civilian mail system, but the fund disbursements from Konoha's various funds always came within a certain period of time, and always ran out in a much shorter period of time than that. Old Man Sarutobi had, at about the time that Naruto had started the Academy, sat him down and forced accounting down his throat. It was because of this that Naruto could manage his own money, and also because of this that Naruto had gradually accumulated enough spare cash that he actually needed a bank account for it.

When he was much younger, however, he'd spend it in exactly the ways he wasn't supposed to - paying off one bill in it's entirety, and having nothing left over for food for two weeks, or buying a full pantry of food and having no electricity. Of course, Naruto had coped, spending extra time in the Hokage's office during long, cold winters, and taking huge portions of the Academy supplied lunches. Not to mention, of course, Ichiraku's constant supplements to his diet as a small child.

The twelfth of any given month was one of the worst days for the impulse spender, because it left just about ten days for the next check to come in. Ten days of worrying, of stress, and of something Naruto was sure Sasuke was _very_ familiar with, guilt.

Part of Naruto wanted to ask up front why Sasuke need to rely on checks from the Orphan's Relief Fund (because obviously, Sasuke wasn't a Widow, had all his limbs, and had never given birth to a shinobi-baby, which eliminated quite a few of the options) when the Uchiha clan was reputed to be so wealthy, but somehow knew that the question was the equivelent of covering himself in cats and running into the Inuzuka compound. In short, a very, very painful mistake.

Instead, Naruto scratched the side of his neck easily. "Eh," he began, and the blonde could see Sasuke look his way through a cracked eye, "I kinda owe you half a bento, remember? This way, you can't call me up on it later, and I'll be able to really milk my next big favor." He cocked his head. "Kakashi said we had an hour for this mission. Well, the hour's almost up, the paperwork's submitted, and we have at least half an hour, probably more, to kill before he shows up again. I don't know about you, but I'd rather be eating." He stopped. "Well?"

"...it had better not be Ramen, idiot." Sasuke had taken one step forward, and then another, and before Naruto knew it, they were all seated at one of the newly cleaned picnic tables. Naruto was sitting alone (like usual) on one side, and Sasuke was across from him, Sakura sitting far too close to Sasuke for either boy's comfort

"Right! Let's see what I have here." Naruto hummed as he tore open the wrapped sack of food (because it really didn't qualify as just a "bag"), taking out a sandwich, a bag of chips, a small container of nuts, three pieces of unidentifiable fruit, and a small block that still felt cold. He paused and glanced at his team. Sakura looked like she was halfway between a question and a heart attack, and Sasuke was looking hungrily at the sandwich. Naruto had the feeling that, if Makoto were actually here, she'd be straping a funnel into Sasuke's mouth and forcing him to actually eat something for once.

Three sandwiches (tomato, turkey, and something that was red, round, and smelled sweet, yet was apparently made of _meat_), three _more_ pieces of fruit, a stack of crackers, a container of cheese, two small pints of milk, a piece of moist chocolate cake, three more bags of chips in different flavors, and a small container full of smiley-face shaped chocolate chip pancakes left over from breakfast later, Sakura wasn't even trying to hide the twitch of her eye, and Sasuke wasn't trying to hide the hunger on his face.

"Well, damn." He paused, taking in the fact that Makoto was apparently the long lost master of Ninja Lunch Packing, before rubbing his hands together. "Well, let's eat. Dibs on the sandwich with that red whatever-it-is in it!".

It turned out to be less of a meal and more of a war-zone. Naruto didn't exactly know _how_ Sasuke managed to propel a third of an apple half-way across the park without trying, and he never wanted to remember the look on Sakura's face when he reached for that slice of chocolate cake, even though he knew it would haunt his nightmares. Fruit passed overhead in an impromptu juggling act that even got a smirk out of Sasuke, and Sakura managed to get both containers of milk open after both Naruto and Sasuke "loosened them for her". Sakura's "small lunch" was brought out and laid on the table, but Naruto found that most of her traditional bento was over looked in favor of his grandmother's cooking.

He couldn't help the smile that crept across his features when he thought about Makoto at home. He just _knew_ that she'd love the fact that other people loved her cooking. He slowed down his murderous rampage against the Tomato Sandwich civilazation (he'd been running campaigns against the Food Continent since he was five, and Kyuubi or no Kyuubi, he wasn't going to stop it now or ever), because he could imagine the smile lighting up her face, and for a moment, even food didn't seem as important as that.

"Oh? What's this?" Sakura's voice was curious, and Naruto woke from his fantasy to glance at her. She held his lunch sack in one hand, and a white envelope in the other. She must've sensed Naruto watching her, because she turned his way. "I found this hidden at the bottom." She grinned, and Naruto could practically _feel_ the evil in her eyes. "Is it a love note? You can't cook like this - We've eaten your mission cooking before. It must be a girlfriend!" She concluded, holding the envelope up to a sunset sky rich with scarlet and streaks of dark, almost violet clouds as if she were holding it up to the noon day sun. Naruto pouted. She really didn't seem broken up about it. At all. Or, in any way, shape or form. Mentally, he crossed off "Make her Jealous" from his "Ways to get Sakura-chan to recognize how awesome I am!" list.

"Pshaw," Sasuke spat, and Naruto paused because he never heard anybody actually _say_ that before, "There's no way that the idiot could possibly have a girlfriend." Naruto mentally added "...before me." at the end of that, because Sasuke actually sounded _worried. _

The Uchiha reached over and plucked the envelope from Sakura's hands, and she actually looked rather put-out because of it. He easily tore open one edge of the envelope, and Naruto launched across the top of the table, suddenly struck by the revelation that, since Makoto packed his lunch, it would stand to reason that Makoto wrote the letter, and there was no telling what revealing lines were hidden in there.

But, despite Naruto's continual efforts for the last few months, Sasuke was _still_ faster than he was, especially when he didn't have his legs twisted around a bench like Naruto did.

"Dear Naruto," Sasuke began, jumping on the table and swiftly leaping onto the branches above them. Sakura began grabbing the small, empty containers before Naruto could crush them as he flopped and struggled to get free.

"Don't say another word, Sasuke! I'm warning you!" Naruto growled. He saw a flash of red in the corner of his vision, and he realized that it was actually Sakura. He felt her hands wrap around his ankles and suddenly, he had the strangest urge to go very, very still. Those few moments were all Sakura needed to untie part of his leg-wrap and weave it into the other one, making the most effective bind he'd ever been in. "Oh, that's just _no fair."_

He sighed, and resigned himself to the fact that all of his secrets would be revealed in a few short minutes. Well, he consoled himself, except for the Kyuubi thing.

"Dear Naruto," Sasuke began again with a smirk, leaping back down from the branches to stand only feet away from Naruto, balanced on the bench as if he were the key speaker at a prestigeous conference. Naruto glared at him fiercly, wishing for all the world that Sakra would let go of his legs . "Last night was one of the best nights of my life, because meeting you gave me a new reason to live. I can't stop thinking about the time we shared, and I realize now that it wasn't enough - I want more. It's strange that I want so much of you and of your time, but there are so many things I want to know about you. Your favorite food. Your favorite song. Your hopes, your dreams, your passions. I want to spend the rest of my life by your side, and my only hope is that you feel the same way.

I only hope some of what I feel for you came through in this letter, because even during those few occasions we spent in the kitchen, the laundry room, and in your living room, I couldn't find words to tell you what I truly felt. I wish I could be with you now, when you read this. I wish that I could say this to your face."

Sasuke's tone was weak and sickly by the last sentence, each word squeaking its way out only because his tongue had been so intent on reading it that it hadn't stopped. Sakura, behind him, went slack, and he felt her hands loosen around his ankles. That was the chance he needed - he twisted his body, forcing all his muscles tense. He winced when he realized that he used part of Sakura's stomach as a springboard, but had to concentrate on doing a quick flip that sent him onto a handstand on the picnic table. The handstand flawlessly morphed into an attack, because as he twisted again, he used his arms to wrap around Sasuke's neck.

Naruto's weight forced them both to the ground, and Naruto had to brace himself with his elbows to keep from falling on Sasuke and smothering the bastard (though, it would only serve him right). In all the effort, though, Makoto's letter hadn't left the Uchiha's hands, and Sasuke squeaked out the last few lines, the sound _almost_ muffled by Naruto's clothing.

"I love you, Naruto, and I long for the day when we can say such things to each other without shame."

There was a great and horrible pause, and something like a cross between a scream and a gasp from Sakura. It sounded like air rushing from a tea kettle.

"Aaaah," and Naruto _knew_ who the voice belonged to just as surely as he knew that he truly, deeply wished to die. Inevitably, his eyes met Sasuke's in equal horror. "I see I'm interupting something." There were footsteps, and both Sasuke and Naruto watched two familiar feet stop beside them. There was complete and utter silence in the entire clearing, before Kakashi squatted down so that both boys could see his face. "But, don't stop on my account."

"OH GOD." was chorused with "PERVERT", and the two boys struggled to seperate from each other. But, Naruto's legs were still tied, and Sasuke was too focused on getting _away_ that he didn't realize that lifting his hips only made the situation worse. Grasping for some extra leverage, Naruto braced his hands against the taller boy's shoulders, firmly pressing him to the ground. Unfortunately, this pressed his wrapped legs in between Sasuke's, and both boys screamed even louder than before.

"Aaah, you know..." Kakashi began, one eye wide as one hand scratched near his eyebrow, "I didn't mean that literally. You can stop any time now." There was more frantic scrambling to get seperated, which predictably only made things that much worse. "Seriously."

"Oh, for heaven's sake!" Sakura snapped, stomping over to the three males, one hand, oddly enough, covering her lower face. She used her other hand to haul Naruto up by the back of his sweatshirt, letting go of him sharply as he stood up. With a shaky nod, the blonde began working on untying her handiwork, concentrating on that and _nothing else_.

The kunoichi took one of Sasuke's hands and pulled him up. Shakily, he stood, running one hand through his hair, breathing evenly.

This lasted for about a minute until his face turned even paler than his normal milky complexion, and he ran off into the bushes. There was the sound of massive heaving.

Naruto saw Kakashi sweatdrop and scratch the back of his head, and concentrated that much harder on finally untying the last knot in his leggings. There was a sick, coppery smell, and Naruto jerked up, only to see Kakashi do the same. The two males found their gaze fastened to Sakura, whose cupped hand slowly drew back.

"Oh, _geez_. Sakura, I thought I just hit your stomach! When did I get your nose?". The blonde quickly reached into his courier's bag, easily pulling out the ready-sterilized bandages inside of a hidden pocket. He handed them to her, and she looked away. The Kyuubi-vessel's heart sank.

"...You didn't." Her voice was dull, but she was watching Kakashi, who suddenly began laughing.

"What do you mean?" He wondered. "How did you get a nosebleed if you weren't hit?"

"Drop it right now, Uzumaki, if you want to live to see your girlfriend again." The kunoichi balled the bandages and tilted back her head.

"What?" Kakashi gasped, one hand suddenly clutching his chest, "You mean, our little Naruto-kun really _does_ have a girlfriend?"

Sakura waved one hand to where both Naruto and Sasuke had laid together just moments before. She quickly turned around, looking for all the world as if she loved looking at the sunset, and the massive bloodstain on her uniform was just a design (which, for a kunoichi, could've actually been true).

Before Naruto could even start sprinting towards the letter, Kakashi bent over to pick it up. "Dear Naruto," he sang, and suddenly went silent, his eye darting back and forth as he read the lines. His eyebrows rose, his eyes got wide, and Naruto could see the older man's lips move under his mask. The jonin even glanced up at him a few times, as if associating Naruto with the letter at hand.

Abruptly, the jonin stood. "Well, I have to say that I'm impressed, Naruto." The blonde raised an eyebrow, and Kakashi happily continued. "In all my years, I have to admit that I've never gotten a thank you note from a girl for the night before."

Naruto's brain stopped. "W-what?"

"I'm so very proud! But, you have to be careful. She talks about love and togetherness an awful lot - you might want to run away before she starts asking for a ring." His tone became very serious. "It's very difficult to run away at that point, because they're usually wise enough to use drugs at that stage." He paused. "Or, are you dating a civilian?"

"D-dating?" Naruto's fingers twitched.

The jonin made a noise in his throat and turned towards the blonde. "Oh, you mean you're not dating? It was just a one-time fling?" There was a silence, and it sounded like Sakura was choking. The sounds of Sasuke's heaving blended into the background noise of the forest far too easily. "Very good!" The jonin crowed.

Naruto sweatdropped.

"Now, did you use protection last night?" For the first time, Kakashi actually sounded like _Iruka_, the question asked with the same mothering tone that the Academy teacher used.

"...I had a few kunai left in my clothes. Why?"

"...Er, Naruto, that's not quite what I meant." He paused, his head cocked as if in deep thought. "Do you know how some shinobi use katanas, and those katanas are contained in sheaths? Well..." He stopped. "Wait, maybe I'm getting this wrong. This girl - what's her name?" Kakashi asked, and Naruto, so deeply in denial that the entire scene was taking place, could only answer in hopes that it would continue and reveal itself to be a dream.

"Makoto. Her name's Makoto. She's not a ninja." He had to concentrate not just on breathing _in_, but_ out_ as well, something he discovered after a few unsuccessful attempts at making his brain explode. Apparently, it - or the fox - refused to put him out of his mercy.

"Ah, Makoto. Right, right. "Sincere". Very nice. Anyway...not a kunoichi. Is she around your age, then?" Kakashi idly taped the letter with two fingers, scrolling down the page as if looking for certain words.

Naruto shook his head. "Nope. Older." Vaguely, he realized that part of his head was making a plan. He didn't know exactly what Kakashi was getting at, but perhaps there was a way to keep his grandmother a secret for just a while longer.

"Ah. So, well, there's no real way to ask this nicely. Is she a "Lady of the Night"?" The way Kakashi spoke the word was on the same level of respect as when he talked about the Hokage. Sakura, off to the side, squeaked. The bushes off to the side rattled, and Sasuke stumbled out, looking for all the world completely exhausted.

Naruto thought back to the night previous, and the way that Makoto kept yawning towards the end of their conversation at Ichiraku's, and then during their talk at the fountain. He shook his head. "No, I think she's more of a morning person."

Kakashi's face, for lack of a better word, fell. He tapped his cheek with one finger. "Well, let me ask you this. Last night, she stayed with you?" Kakashi continued on even before Naruto nodded. "Now, was there money involved in this?"

"Well, yeah. She kept wanting to pay me, but I told her-". Sakura choked, and Kakashi nodded thoughtfully.

Sasuke shook his head. "He's trying to ask you if Makoto is a prostitute, you idiot."

A ball of anger as red-hot and large as the sun exploded in his belly, and it was this fire that fueled his super-human speed. A breath hadn't passed a single lip before Naruto swung his fist at Sasuke, hitting the side of the Uchiha's face full on. He pulled his fist back for another hit, but Sakura had grabbed a hold of his elbow, and Kakashi was suddenly standing in back of him, one large hand on Naruto's smaller shoulder. The blonde couldn't see it, and couldn't say afterwards if Kakashi-sensei and Sakura had caught it either, but Sasuke couldn't but notice the way the blonde's face almost seemed more angular, the whisker markings darker and deeper than before. Naruto growled, words falling from his lips like hisses.

"I'll _kill you_ if you talk about my Grandmother like that again!"

The first thought Naruto had was that the world really should've ended as soon as he said that. It certainly ruined his plan to keep Makoto a secret, and it certainly seemed to rearrange the world completely. Instead of the world rotating around the sun, the entire universe hinged on the small point of contact between Kakashi's hand and Naruto's shoulder. Naruto creaked his neck around, slowly trying to see the jonin from the corner of his eye. There should've been a stunned silence, but instead, Sakura was asking questions that filled the air incomprehensibly, and Sasuke was rubbing the already coloring flesh of his cheek with a frown, and a thoughtful pause that spoke volumes, as it was filled with all the ways that he would make Naruto pay for the hit later on.

"Naruto," Kakashi began, and the blonde's heart sank because his sensei's voice wasn't filled with wonder, wasn't even close to the playful tone Kakashi could adopt on a dime. Instead, it was dull, dead and at the same time angry. The only word for it was focused. Kakashi was focused on him in much the same way that the teachers had looked at him in the academy when he did something spectacularly stupid. "What have you _done?"_

* * *

YES! Finished this chapter. Thank goodness. 

Thanks for all the reviews so far. They're _huge_ ego-boosts, and my favorite part has to be when you guys quote your favorite lines. I know that when I read fics, there are always lines that echo in my thoughts for days upon days, and I really hope I'm passing some of those along in my own way.

Anyway, had more Team 7 interaction, and I'm actually proud of most of it. Yes, there is a lot of action with the clones, but frankly, I'm beginning to like where it's going. Naruto has also been tagged as more intelligent than he is in canon. Well, I'm going to play my "First Fic!" card in Defence Mode, thus protecting my Life Points from attack. (I apologize for being a huge nerd). When I read the manga, I automatically try to reason why the characters act the way that they do, and believing that Naruto really _can't_ be as stupid as he looks sometimes helps me get through some of the most embarrassing chapters.

But, yeah. Hope you had fun with this chapter, because it was really hard to eek this out at the start. Questions, comments, and anything else are more than welcome. ...Enjoy!


	10. Many Meetings with the Lotus

Chapter 10

_"Naruto, what have you __**done**__?"_

Nothing existed in the world except for the anger present in Kakashi's eye. Slowly, the world unfolded around it, revealing the slant of Kakashi's eyebrow, the tense tremble of the man's chin under the mask, the twisted, looming posture of the jonin, and finally, the sharp, pressure of Kakashi's hand on Naruto's shoulder, grasping so tightly that it would leave bruises.

"Sensei!" Sakura's voice split the universe in two, and suddenly, Naruto realized that he had to breathe, something that was happening more frequently as of late than if ever truly should have. She stood a few feet away firmly planted between them. She was deliberately loud in her footsteps as she came forward, her hands extended to her sides and in front of her, a joint gesture of peace and a show that she had no weapons ready.

"Sensei," she continued, and her tone made Kakashi's fingers loosen the minuscule fraction Naruto needed to shake them away, "I don't understand. I thought Naruto is...was...an orphan?" She glanced to Naruto, and the blond could only open his mouth before Kakashi's gaze was focused on him again.

"'Orphan'", Sasuke interjected smoothly, coming to the other side of Naruto and Kakashi in much the same manner of Sakura, "only means that one has no parents. It doesn't mean that they have no relatives." He stopped, and his tone was level, his volume normal, and his voice dead as he finished. "There has never been a word for one without any family at all."

"Kakashi-sensei, look, I can totally and completely explain everything!" Naruto began, and he opened his mouth to continue, realizing halfway through a breath that his tongue seemed too big for his mouth, and his teeth kept getting in the way. He balled his hands at his sides, forcing the deep anger had had at Sasuke just seconds before into small, red-hot balls at the ends of his fingertips. He forced himself to stare his teacher in the eye, and all he could think about was how, exactly, he was going to salvage this situation.

The silver-haired man saved him from having to muddle through the complicated sentences racing through his mind by speaking first. "You are a fool." the man stated, slowly turning his gaze to Sakura, then Sasuke, and then Naruto. He paused, and seemed to watch the blond as Naruto placed one foot behind him, and then another, until he was out of arms reach of the older shinobi. "You," the man repeated, "could have, perhaps you have already, put all of Konohagakure in danger."

Naruto saw Sasuke raise an eyebrow, and saw Sakura's mouth pucker to one side as if she was trying to figure out just how Naruto could be a danger to _anyone_. Kakashi fixed him with a stare, and the stare slowly sank lower and lower on the blonde's body, completely different from the way the teacher examined his clothes just hours earlier. Kakashi's eye, possibly even his _eyes_ were glued to the pocket of Naruto's sweatshirt. More precisely, the point just behind it.

The seal.

Naruto jumped. His eyebrows rose to his hairline, and he shook his head mutely. "No! Hey, I wouldn't _ever_ do to that to Konoha! It's," and he rolled his hands for a moment, pausing as he searched his memory for a word, "_home_. Yeah, it's my home, and I'd rather slit my stomach than do something to hurt it." He glanced at Kakashi, who almost looked like he'd gone pale (or, at least, slightly paler than he was before). He inhaled sharply, standing upright to his full height, which still only reached the middle part of Kakashi's chest. He felt like a child. "Seriously."

There was silence, and Naruto couldn't hear his own breathing, but Sakura's was as loud as wind buffeting a metal building in a storm. The red hot rage still balled in his fingertips migrated up, tracing the veins in his body until they swirled in his chest again. He frowned, fangs bared over his lips as he glared upwards defiantly. "Why the hell are you so angry about it? I'd _never_ betray Konoha. If that's what you think...". Naruto stopped, and tried to decide whether he wanted to keep watching Kakashi, or whether he wanted to continue his speech at all.

It struck him suddenly that perhaps Kakashi _knew_ that Naruto wouldn't hurt Konoha. The _concept_ of Konoha, where people with bloodlines, civilians, and "normal" shinobi could co-exist peacefully, was too precious to let die, and Naruto had decided what seemed like _ages_ ago, long before he'd gotten his headband, that he'd die for Konoha first. After that came his precious people, and because all of his precious people were from Konoha, there hadn't ever been a conflict of interest. But, maybe Kakashi was angry because Naruto did now have people who were not from Konoha - obviously, someone claiming to be a relative of Naruto's couldn't have been there very long.

Naruto tasted that explanation, and found it satisfying. He forcibly halted his train of thought there, because only inches down the track was the idea that, if Kakashi knew _Naruto_ wouldn't betray Konoha, even for his relatives, his sensei might have believed the _Kyuubi_ inside of Naruto would, and that was something that the vessel couldn't think about, for fear of the fact that it could be true.

"I love Konoha." He lifted his head high, resisting the urge to spit into Kakashi's face, because at the moment, Kakashi wasn't even himself, wasn't the sensei who forced vegetables down his throat on a rather regular basis, and was instead a symbol of Naruto's own doubt. "_You_ are the fool if you believe otherwise. The huge mobs? The evil shinobi when I was a kid? Hell, they're bastards, but I've forgiven them, you know? I've figured out why they've done what they've done. I've forgiven the housewives, and the nurses, and all the other children and their parents. I've forgiven the countless, faceless shinobi, and even the creepy ones with masks. I've forgiven the Sandaime _and_ the Yondaime."

Sakura was watching him with undisguised confusion on her face, and Sasuke's expression was only guarded by a thin, half-hearted mask of indifference. For a moment, Naruto couldn't help but glance at them, and his tongue licked the back of his teeth as he stopped the word "Kyuubi" from even forming on his lips.

"Listen. Sure, the people of Konoha have done crappy stuff. Hell, most of them are probably dicks. I'm on a team with their Prince." Naruto jerked his head to Sasuke, who growled. "Anyway, that doesn't change the fact that the Village of Konoha, the Village Hidden in the Leaves, is ...well, a "precious person" to me. So," he concluded, "Don't think for a single instant that Makoto isn't precious to me. She is. Don't think for a single instant that Sakura-chan isn't precious to me, because you know damn well better than that. Hell, I'd probably rescue Sasuke if he was drowning or something, even though I wouldn't give him mouth to mouth, because well, that's really, really gross, and I don't wanna go through that again."

Kakashi blinked, Sakura snorted, and Sasuke shuddered. Naruto took these all to be good signs because, while they were doing that, their hands weren't going for their weapons, which was always a very good thing.

"What that means is that you're _all_ precious people to me, even when you _are_ dicks. Which, I mean, is most of the time for you." He didn't even need to glance at Sasuke to catch the dark-haired boy's snarl. "But, well, I'm not gonna go and rob a bank just because Sakura asks me to," he paused, "well, unless there's a date involved. And, I'm not gonna go and kick a box of kittens or nothing just because Sasuke really hates them." He glanced up. "I bet you do, you weird kitten-hating monster."

There was more silence, but from Sakura, it looked like the "Oh God, I can't breathe" sort of silence. Sasuke was actually _pouting_, and Naruto almost thought that he was going to protest the "Kitten-hater" remark. Naruto breathed again, and the fact that he remembered to do so gave him a sort of strength.

"You probably don't know this..." Naruto began, and he lowered his tone and leaned closer into Kakashi. He was sure that Sakura and Sasuke - well, probably only Sasuke - would still hear them, but it was the principle of the act that meant more. "Anyway, when I was a kid, there were a lot of...", he paused, biting his lip for a moment, "well, "assassination attempts"." The blond glanced back at Sasuke. "I'm not gonna tell you why. Anyway, there were assassination plots, and people who tried to poison me, and all that sort of stuff. I had-"and he paused again, realizing that he couldn't say "ANBU" because there weren't very many good reasons why ANBU would be guarding a small child that he could think of at the moment which didn't involve either the truth about the Kyuubi, or the idea that he was long-lost royalty hidden in Konoha, which actually wasn't far from it's own truth.

"I had _people_," he decided finally, "who were looking out for me. I'd probably be dead without 'em. Anyway, I had to be careful about who to trust, because I never knew whose batch of cookies were poisonous, or which grocery story would switch expiration labels on food to make me sick, or even who not to follow down dark alleys." He stopped. "You know, it turned out the answer to every one of those is "all of them", now that I think about it." He shook his head. "But, I mean, I know that I only caught the tip of the ice burg. The creepy people who looked out for me, well, I'm sure they caught most of 'em. Despite that, _I_ caught the rest, and I had to learn from that about who I could trust, and what I could eat without throwing up all over the place, and which areas to avoid completely.

"See, what I'm getting at is that I gained something - maybe it's not "instinct", because I'm pretty sure you have to be born with that - but it's because of whatever it was that I gained that I'm still alive. See, when I trust people," he emphasized with his hands, feeling free enough to gesticulate his point, "I _really_ trust people." He pivoted on his heel and turned to Sasuke. "Except you."

"So far," he continued, "I have to say that whatever it was that I learned from time and experience hasn't failed me yet, because despite the odds, I'm not dead. Anyway, this "instinct", this "skill", this "gut feeling" or whatever the hell it really is - it's telling me that I can trust Makoto. Hell, it practically glued me to her when I first met her." He smiled despite himself, and one hand drew close to his stomach. "It feels like a fishhook, right here. But," and he glanced at Sakura, "I don't know if that's normal or nothing because frankly, how could I? I've never had parents or nothing like this before. I've never had a _family_."

His eyes met Kakashi's, and there was another silence. The blond frowned. "Why aren't you saying anything? Geez, I don't think I've ever talked this much in my entire life."

There was a single, perfect moment as three voices synchronized. "Yes, you have."

Naruto sweat dropped. "Er, well...whatever. What I've been trying, and well, failing to explain is the fact that I'm not gonna do anything stupid. Even _I_ know better than to say "Hey, look! Konohagakure's weak points!" to the first person who makes me pancakes that aren't poisoned. I'm not gonna introduce the Hokage to "Mr. Stabby McStabstab" even if he does invite me to the movies, you know?" The blond ran one hand through his spiky hair, and he was momentarily distracted by the revelation that, despite all the things that had happened through the day, it still was pointy almost to the point of damage. He sighed. "Look, just trust me, okay? She's a danger to no one in Konoha." He stopped. "Well, she's a danger to no one who doesn't really irk her, but frankly, I think all women are that way."

Sakura glared at him, and he winced. "What?" he protested, frowning at the kunoichi, "it's not like it's a lie or anything!"

"All that I'm asking, Kakashi-sensei," he started, making sure to emphasis the title for once, "is that you give Chicken Ramen a chance."

There was a pause.

"Excuse me?" Kakashi's eyebrow had arched, and Naruto sighed in relief that, at the very least, Kakashi still hadn't brought out weapons or dashed off to the Hokage's Tower.

"It's like you've spent your entire life eating Shrimp Ramen, right? Like, the only stand in your entire city served just that, and after a while, you just expect every stand to have nothing but Shrimp. But, you go to another city, and_ bam_," he shouted, punching his open palm with a fist, "a stand with Chicken. You don't want to give it a try because it's not Shrimp, and you think it's not gonna be as good as what you had at home, but, well, if you don't try it, you'll never know whether it was a good thing or not."

"Goddamn pauses," he muttered under his breath. Another moment passed.

"Hm. Let's pretend that, for the first time in recorded shinobi history, a twelve year old knows better than their teacher. Let's say that, despite the incredible odds against it, you managed to meet your grandmother. Let's even say that she really _is_ your grandmother, and not a murderous shinobi with a grudge from a far off nation, intent on attacking you, the first dupe she found, and creating an international war. If, Naruto, all of this is true," Kakashi said with a weighty hesitation, "what exactly are you going to do about it?"

Naruto shrugged, closing his eyes as a sign of trust. He cracked his knuckles and crossed his arms above his head. "Listen, this whole family thing is new to me. But, Makoto and I talked this morning, well, we kinda actually argued, but it ended up that we agreed that we're just gonna ...well, wing it."

Sasuke snorted. "Typical." The dark haired boy shared a glance with Sakura, who shook her head with what could have been a smile. "She already seems just like you."

Naruto grinned. "She is! And Haruka is exactly-"

"Haruka?" Kakashi prodded, and Naruto winced.

He exhaled deeply. "Well, she's my Aunt. You know, Makoto's daughter?" Kakashi eyed him speculatively. "I was gonna mention her! It just seemed like a bit much for you guys to take in at once, y'know?"

Sasuke snorted. "You didn't plan on telling us about them at all, did you?" The Uchiha rubbed his cheek, which had gradually darkened to a dark brown bruise that looked perfectly out of place on the pale skin around it.

Despite himself, Naruto felt a sense of satisfaction at a job well done. "Well, eventually. You know, I just wanted to give them a couple of months to settle in, and I could drop some subtle hints about them here and there..."

"'Subtle hints"?" Sakura questioned. She looked at Sasuke, and the Uchiha looked back at her, and then both genin glanced at Kakashi.

"Hey! Seriously." Sakura snorted, and that led into giggles, which was followed shortly after by Sasuke snorting. Kakashi laughed behind him, and Naruto turned and gave the man a dirty look. "I really would've learned to be subtle!"

"Right." Kakashi intoned, and Naruto nearly had a heart attack out of relief because some of Kakashi's normal humor was back in his voice. There was some semblance of normality back in Team 7, and no one had to nearly die for it to happen.

It was a miracle.

"So, Kakashi-sensei, can you promise me that you won't drag them before the Hokage or ANBU? Or, you know, threaten them with weapons or blackmail or anything? I mean, you have to be nice to them! Makoto's pretty old, you know." Naruto wniced despite himself, and Kakashi gave him a look. "Yeah, I'll explain later." The blonde glanced at his two team mates, and saw that Sakura looked like she was bursting with questions, and Sasuke was bursting with something that was either equal curiosity or the urge to main and destroy Naruto. "Really, I'll explain everything that I know about. I just met them yesterday, you know, so you'd really have to ask them about most of it..."

"I will." Naruto froze, tongue curled in the middle of a word while his fingers were half-curled in a gesture. Kakashi _smirked_ at Naruto, and turned to glance at Sakura, a lazy smile in his eye. "I've already met with Sakura's family. Very nice people." He stopped. "Has your Aunt Keiko stopped going to counseling for that night yet?"

Sakura growled. "Not yet. She still has that restraining order against you, you know, and my Uncle's training to learn to write explosive notes."

"Oh?", Kakashi asked, rubbing his chin thoughtfully, "How far along is he?"

"Well, about three thousand slips of paper and fourteen ink pots." Sakura stated, and Kakashi nodded.

"Aah. Well, Sakura can attest to how much I just _adore_ meeting the kin of my cute little students. Finally, I can give one of my boys the same attention!"

Naruto turned to Sasuke, who seemed to lurk in the growing shadows of the forest. "I have never envied you for having no family before, you poor, lucky bastard."

Sasuke seemed torn between a frown and a smirk, and finally settled on a shrug of one shoulder that could be interpreted as "I don't care", "Shut up", and "I absolutely agree with you."

Sakura cleared her throat. "So, I have a question about Makoto. How on earth could she have convinced you that she was your grandmother so quickly?" She stopped. "Well, I mean, aside from the fact that you're incredibly guliable. Does she have proof?"

Naruto scowled for a second, then recalled the occasions in the academy where he'd learned that strange cans labeled "Party Nuts" usually didn't contain nuts at all, borrowing a pair of binoculars from Kiba usually ended in black eyes for both parties, and Shikamaru used any and all methods to cheat, including double-sided coins, when it came to betting on chores.

The blond nodded, granting Sakura her point. "Well, she has pictures, stories about her past, my grandfather, and my own father which really match stuff I've done, and my personality and stuff, she and Haruka both really look like me, and ...well, the whole "fishhook" thing."

"Oh?" Kakashi interupted, "It's your father she claims relations to? Interesting." He rubbed his chin, and Naruto had to scowl at him. "So, who was your father, according to "Makoto"?"

Naruto felt a sudden surge of panic. He _could_ tell the truth, that his father was Kazama Arashi. There was a chance that Kakashi might not know the fact that it was the Yondaime's original name. To his knowledge, the Sandaime was the only Kage who's name was publisized, mainly because of the fact that he had family still living. Naruto wasn't sure if the Shodaime or Nidaime had any family, but if they had, they'd be older than dirt by now, or already dead. Naruto had the option of either telling the truth, or badly lying to the very experienced jonin trained specifically to pick up fear and hesitation, which eventually cycled back to being forced to tell the truth anyway.

Naruto sighed. "Alright. See, when I met her yesterday, she was looking for her son-" he was interupted.

"Uzumaki Naruto?"

The figure leaped from the treetop, granting Naruto a moment of pause because the small park they were in was located on a high, grassy hill with no other trees in sight. The kyuubi-vessel decided that the ANBU - for Naruto recognized the skin tight jumpsuit at first glance - just did it for dramatic effect.

This ANBU was male, a fact deduced as much from the broad shoulders and the placement of the hips, as from the fact that the ANBU was wearing a _skin tight bodysuit_.

Behind the blond, Sakura cringed, and Sasuke turned away. Naruto had to valiently resist the urge to cover his eyes.

The ANBU, masked with something that could be mistaken as an ox on a very foggy road during a New Moon, glanced at Kakashi, whose eye was actually belaying his irritation. "I have orders to escort Uzumaki Naruto to the Hokage's Tower for an audience with the Honorable Sandaime. He is your genin?" The ANBU had a deep, echoing voice that made it seem like he was speaking from the middle of a very large cave.

Kakashi nodded, and Naruto could _swear_ he saw something else pass through Kakashi's eye - a sort of silent communication that Naruto couldn't even begin to understand - to the ANBU. "Naruto is my genin." He scratched the back of his neck. "What has he done now?"

Naruto felt a thick, heavy dread settle onto his skin, and it clung to him like a thousand tiny droplets of lead. There was the chance that the crowd that had gathered when he'd first run into Makoto had started rumors about her that navigated their way to the Hokage. There was the chance that the shinobi there, or the ANBU, if they were still watching him, had caught the scene, or the scene outside the BIRCH office, or the scene in the fountain (which, to Naruto, suddenly seemed like a lot of scenes), and had reported those in much the same way. There was no doubt that the Hokage's office would hold any of Naruto's "relatives" in the same regard as Kakashi. At least Kakashi-sensei was willing to let the possibility exist, but it was quite unlikely that anyone else would do the same.

"I am not allowed to divulge that information", the ANBU reported roboticaly, and Kakashi seemed to nod.

"Well, he's right here," Kakashi stated, pulling out his porn book for the first time in the conversation. Naruto realized with nothing short of awe that this argument had to be the longest time Kakashi had gone without reading his book in front of them since the battle on the bridge with Zabuza. Kakashi was suddenly behind Naruto, and the taller, stronger, older man kicked the back of his shin, making him stumble forward.

The ANBU stared at him, and Naruto could _swear_ that he was starting to "sense" it when jaws were dropping, because despite the years of training, despite the experience the ANBU had to have had to make it to his rank, and despite the fact that he was wearing a fully covering face mask, Naruto could _taste_ the man's utter and complete shock.

"...You're sure?" Ox took a few steps forward, and Naruto felt the urge to sweat drop as the shinobi took long glances at Naruto's hair, courier's bag, and the goggles that he'd actually forgotten he'd been wearing. With a nervous laugh, Naruto peeled them off, pulling his hitai-ite back on as a sign that he really was a ninja. If he was going to the Hokage's Tower, it probably was protocol. He frowned, and pulled a few of his extremely pointy bangs out from behind his headband, where they'd been stabbing him with the intent to annoy. He didn't have a mirror, but thought that they probably covered some of Konohagakure's symbol. He shrugged, because there was very little he could do about that right now without a very sharp kunai and something reflective.

Ox seemed to blink, seemed to shake his head, and seemed to sigh, but all of these could've just been figments of Naruto's imagination, because it would take a very poor ANBU to be that obvious about it all. He _did_ visibly straighten, and he inclined his head to Kakashi. "Your genin will be detained for no longer than one hour," he started, and Naruto felt his shoulders sag in relief.

There were many ways that a meeting at the Hokage's Tower could go. If Naruto had had a written summons from the Hokage's Tower, it be the worst of all the possible meetings, which normally included an audience, fifty minutes of stony glares and complete silence, and a very stiff, straight-backed chair in the center of the room. When he was younger, some of the "good" summons were usually after particularly bad days in class, usually including fights of some kind and the usual stint in the infirmary afterwards. Those had only ten minutes of pointed silence, which was usually broken by some sort of story from Sarutobi's past that had a thinly veiled wise meaning, ending with either ice cream or a trip to Ichiraku's. Those were the sort of summons and meetings that only lasted an hour, as the Sandaime was a very busy man - something that his foul-faced aides never ceased to remind him about.

The other sort of meetings with the Sandaime lasted all day, or all night, or however long he could stay without being kicked out. Those were the days when he'd been without heat, without electricity, without shelter, or without food. Those were the days where he'd fall asleep in the chairs in the lobby, and would wake up covered in thick, mission-grade blankets. There were still some precious documents curled and sealed in the Sandaime's desk, covered in the collected artistic masterpieces of one Naruto Uzumaki, age six, and there had been a time where the Sandaime himself taught Naruto the best way to hold the calligraphy pen and not get splatters of ink on the surrounding four rows. (Naruto actually applied the exact reverse of that lesson the next day, and got one of the hour-long lectures in return).

Naruto turned back to his team mates. "Hey, I'll be fine. I guess we can do the whole, um, "meet and greet" thing later." He glanced up at Ox, who stared back, reminding Naruto of those days in the orphanage, where ANBU would watch through the windows and give other children nightmares.

"No, we can't." Kakashi added. The genin turned to glance at him, and he peeked one eye over the edge of his book. "I have a hair appointment tomorrow, and the reservations just took _months_ to obtain. There's no way that I could possibly skip out. I mean, the other day while I was looking in the mirror, I saw a _grey hair_." Sakura opened her mouth to protest, and it looked for a few moments like she choked on her own tongue. Kakashi ignored her, and continued on. "I suppose we _will_ have to have that little "get together" tonight."

Sakura scowled. "Just when is this appointment, sensei?"

"Hm. When I did I say we were meeting tomorrow?"

Naruto felt a grin pull the edge of his cheek. "I believe it was around Noon, right Sasuke?"

The dark haired boy shrugged a shoulder and grunted, which Naruto took to mean "Indubitably, good sir."

"Aaah. Well, I believe the appointment was for 11:45, then, but goodness, just what are the odds that it will last until," and Kakashi put his finger on his chin thoughtfully, "Oh, about three or so?"

Naruto had to hide his grin by turning towards Ox. If a mask could raise an eyebrow, the ANBU's did. "Well," he called over his shoulder to his team, "I guess if you're looking forward to it that much, I'll take you to the super-secret-special-hiding spot and, uh, we can have tea or something." Naruto shrugged at the end of it. "Should I meet you at the bridge?".

"Oh, we'll be waiting for you outside the Hokage's tower," Sakura said seriously, and behind her, Sasuke actually nodded. "This isn't a matter of life and death. This is a matter of _curiosity_ now, and you should know that shinobi are better than cats when it comes to that."

Naruto puzzled that out. "What, you mean we're more curious than cats? I guess that's true..." he trailed off. Kakashi turned a page in his book with deliberate loudness.

"No, she means that, while curiosity may kill the cat, it's slightly more difficult to kill a shinobi the same way." He peered over the edge of his page at the kunoichi. "Interesting phrase, but a bit too vague for our Naruto-kun. Perhaps something simpler next time, like "Curiosity killed the cat, but if we don't satisfy ours, we'll kill you?". I know, it doesn't quite have the same ring to it, but on occassion, you have to write for the audience..."

Sakura reddened and turned away, while Naruto tried to figure out just how exactly that phrase seemed to fit Sakura perfectly well. Ox, behind them, stood silent and still, which made him stand out in much the same way that a skirt and camisole combination would. 'Right!" Naruto exclaimed, glancing at his team. "I'm leaving. Hokage's Tower, right?" Ox _almost_ looked like he startled, but nodded.

Naruto was off before anyone could say another word.

* * *

There were dozens of hidden tunnels that ran under the Hokage's Tower, and almost that number of nearby rooftops that led into balconies just in reach. All of these, of course, were incredibly monitored through all hours of the day, and a large portion of the security staff in the building were dedicated to watching highly trafficked windows and tunnels. One thing Naruto had never understood was why exactly the Hokage's Tower _needed_ security staff, as there was not a single civilian working in the entire complex, and the Hokage was suposed to be the most powerful ninja in Konoha, anyway. Added to that was the fact that ANBU headquarters was (supposedly) located in the center of the building, and Naruto had actually spent sleepless nights trying to figure out how anyone in the world could be both arrogant enough and stupid enough to even think that they could attack the building and live to get something out of it. 

When Naruto was barely tall enough to see over the Sandaime's crooked knee, the old man had shown him the easiest entrance to gain access into. It, unlike the other doors, tunnels, and windows, required no security clearance, no secret knocks, signals, or keys, and could actually be reached easily by a four year old. The lowest number of security staff watched it, and it was always lighted, always just the right temperature, and always had a fresh supply of piping hot coffee, twenty four hours a day.

Naruto used the front door.

The sliding glass doors beeped briefly as he came in, making sure to carefully wipe his feet on the bright red mat that exclaimed "Welcome!" in bold letters before approaching the front desk. A large, pig-nosed shinobi snoozed, legs propped up on the desk as one hand brushed the stray candy wrappers strewn on the floor.

Naruto leaned closely to the desk, inching closer until he finally used his hands to pull himself up. He crouched on the far edge, glancing at the security monitors of empty windows, dark sewers, the women's section of the Tower's gym, and the most recent episode of Icha Icha Daily, a serialization of the same porn Kakashi read. Naruto heard it had slightly less graphic porn than the novels, but more complex relationships, and plots that didn't even try to make sense.

The Kyuubi-vessel waved his hand in front of the guard's face twice, seeing no visible reaction except for another round of window-shaking snores. Naruto knew from experience that he had the option of waking the guard, waiting for confirmation of his identity through the system, and eventually being personally escorted through four different clearances of security before finally seeing the Hokage. That, of course, was the option he never chose. With a quick, apologetic shrug in the guard's direction, Naruto turned his attention to the small console of blinking lights, switches, and buttons that was covered in a thin layer of dust, a few cobwebs sticking to the upper switches. He deftly toggled a complicated sequence of switches, watching a few lights flicker on and off before finally nodding to himself and grabbing a small, white card that hung from the guard's belt and sliding it under the machine. There was a metallic "ding!", which was entirely ignored by all parties.

Naruto picked up an empty mug from the floor, (it had "Employee of the Month" written on the side), and filled it, putting in three sugars and four creams. He took a few complimentary cookies before using his newly acquired keycard to scan himself through a maze of identical white doors. He calmly sipped his coffee - which didn't taste quite as good as Makoto's, but came close - zigzaging through unmarked hallways. Eventually, he came to the hallway with two fire extinguishers facing each other, found the old-looking door with "NITOR" half-covered in dust, and opened it.

The Hokage's waiting room was immaculate. On either side of him, there were two steel-plated, foot-thick doors that Naruto knew were guarded on the other side by high ranking shinobi and video cameras. There was a thick carpet on the floor with a complicated, ugly design on it (as well as several melted crayons, which were covered by a particularly ugly potted tree), a bright, dangling chandellier that was raised when Naruto reached the age of seven in a grand, highly-attended ceremony, and a large, cluttered desk made of a dark wood just beside two intimidating looking doors that were double barred, triple-locked, and attended on the side by two special ANBU guards.

The two guards glanced his way, their eyes boring holes into him through their masks. He calmly sipped his coffee, and one of the ANBU backed sharply against the wall, hitting his head on the door with a loud thump. He passed out on the floor in what was quite possibly the least dignified pose possible for a shinobi. The other ANBU twitched. "U-Uzumaki Naruto?".

"Yup." There was a startled, high pitched gasp, and Naruto desperately wished that he had his orange jumpsuit with him. Despite the fact that no one recognized him, (something that was a definite plus when it came to buying quality items at a reasonable price and not being accousted in alleyways), the fact that when he _was_ recognized, it caused massive panic was growing old quick. He saw the Hokage's pretty, new secretary bolt out of her chair, standing ramrod straight for a moment before she grabbed the edge of her desk and leaned forward.

"You mean," she whispered, and Naruto began to feel something that felt like paranoia creep across his skin, because she almost sounded _reverant_, "that you're _him? _"The" Uzumaki Naruto?" She paused, and she seemed to be waiting for something. Dumbly, Naruto nodded.

He almost dropped his drink when she shrieked, rushing out from behind her desk and bumping two of the lop-sided towers of paper off her desk in her haste. She skidded to a halt just feet from him, and her hands kept reaching towards him and then darting back. "C-can I touch you?"

Naruto carefully looked for the exits, because there could be no other possible explanation than the fact that this woman was clearly completely insane. "Uh," he grunted, stalling for time as he backed towards the "NITOR" exit, "Sure, I guess."

She squealed again, and Naruto felt his jaw drop as he remembered just where he'd heard that exact squeal before. Ino. Sakura. All the girls in the classes at his academy.

All of them fangirls.

Naruto Uzumaki had a fangirl.

He was so completely frozen that he didn't feel her first poke at all, though his eyes couldn't help but be glued to the spot on his arm where she touched him. She reached out breathless, and as her finger touched the flesh of his arm, she glanced up, her wide eyes full of wonder. "You're real." She whispered. "I didn't think anyone could really do what you've done. I thought you were a legend. But," she murmered, and backed a step away, much to Naruto's great, indescribable relief, "you really are real."

She glanced at the ANBU guard who was presently kicking his companion onto his back, and Naruto took that instant to take a fortifying gulp of sweet, scalding courage.. "Oh! ANBU-san! Could you tell the Hokage-sama that Uzumaki-sama-"

Naruto spewed his coffee across four square feet of expensive imported carpet, and spent the next three minutes trying not to choke to death.

By the time that his body began warming up to the stunning idea that breathing was actually something that needed to be done on a regular basis, both ANBU had straightened into something resembling attentiveness, and the mousy secretary was staring at him with worry in her eyes. "Uzumaki-sama, are you alright?"

Naruto couldn't do anything but twitch. He felt the corner of his eye tic.

"The Hokage-sama is waiting for you." She glanced around at the stains on the carpet, and at the piles of paper on the floor, and blushed. "Oh! I'll get right on cleaning this for you, sir!"

Naruto began backing toward's the Hokage's door, making sure that his back was never turned on the _obviously_ unstable girl.

As the two ANBU signaled the Hokage's doors open, Naruto could hear the secretary mutter, "Oh, just wait until I tell the others!".

Naruto stepped into the Hokage's office, carefully glancing over his shoulder. One ANBU glanced back at him, and when their eyes met, the guard quickly shocked back into his ready position as if he'd never moved. He heard stray words from the large room that faded as he stepped further into the Hokage's sound-proof den. He caught "handsome", "blond", and something that sounded like "work", and then a series of squeals.

He shook his head, his eyes latching onto the familiar, comforting surroundings in search of an anchor from the storm of their insanity. The Hokage's office was almost the exact opposite of his reception area. It was wide and open where the previous room was designed to be cramped and nerve-wrecking, it's barren walls and metallic floors in place of tapestries and carpeting making the area seem three times larger than it actually ways. The panoramic view of the Hokage's memorial was impressive, forboding, and not just a small amount vain. Naruto had always wondered who exactly designed that, and had the feeling that it had to Old Man Sarutobi himself.

.The Yondaime had begun the tradition of spending the excess of his decorating budget on refurbishing the orphanage, something that gained him a huge number of fans among the civilian population, and no small amount of disdain from his advisors. The Sandaime had carried the act on, with only a few concessions from his previous era of reign. There was a large bookshelf on one wall that covered the entire side of the room, packed with books, small potted plants, and the odd, half-unfurled scroll. The bookshelf had the excellent second function of hiding the secret door to the Hokage's small meditation area, where he practiced the sacred art of divination, an art he had refined over many decades by using it to spy on pretty girls. There were also a few scroll-paintnigs in the wall, some drawn with such tiny threads of ink that it looked like the artist used hair to do it, and others of gigantic panoramas with rock faces so huge and tangible that it looked like you could reach through the paper and fall out on the other side.

Naruto knew this office as an old friend. He was one of the few who knew that between "Meta-Phsyics of Para-Chakra Anatomical Anomalies" and "Insubstantial Quantum Bonds" were the first two Icha Icha books, first edition and signed by the author. There was a small collection of coloring books beside incomprehensible seal blueprints, a small scattering of incomplete homework assignments mixed with forgotten, unsigned paperwork, and the odd take out menu stuck in spare cracks between books, used as page markers, or folded neatly as origami swans.

Naruto had spent many peaceful nights here, a few stressful days, and the odd marathon of weeks where, by the end of it, he had been taking showers in the ANBU locker room and having three meals a day that consisted solely of expresso and muffins. Some workers in the office still shuddered when those days were mentioned, but Naruto couldn't quite understand why, as those walls had all been replaced by now, the ceilings had been painted, and the mail sorter in the lowest level of the building could now say his name without bursting into tears. The genin figured that if _that guy _could laugh about those days now, no one else had the right to be upset about it. When he was a child, he had considered the Hokage's Tower a second home, but he could see now that it had never been because of the heat, electricity, free food, or working showers. Instead, it had been about the days he'd spent coloring, hidden by the Hokage's desk as he spoke with his advisors, the steady, nose-burning smell of pipe-smoke forever engraining itself his memory.

The Hokage sat in the center of the room at a large, familiar wooden desk that was said to have been carved by the Shodaime himself from the largest tree in Konoha. Frankly, Naruto didn't see the point in cutting down the largest tree anywhere, especially when it was just to make a desk. Part of him understood the fact that legends like that tend to intimidate other people, and it was probably to enhance the Hokage's mystique around visitors. The other part of Naruto mourned the loss of a fantastic hiding spot and potential aerial bombardment center for water balloons. The desk was full of hidden compartments, secret buttons that activated everything from full-blown red alert for the tower to the small black and white TV hidden in the bottom of the third drawer (Naruto had been given access to the second of these, but _never_ the first, under the threat of a complete and thourough ban of the color orange), compartments for pens, small alcoves for kunai, and the occasional locked box that Naruto actually hadn't been able to open.

Sarutobi chewed on the edge of his pen, his knobby fingers carefully leafing through a hulking binder of paper. He was frowning, and Naruto suddenly didn't like his odds of this being a "fun" lecture. There wasn't a chair placed ominously in the center of the room, which was a sort of a relief, but there wasn't another chair in the office at all, which meant that the Hokage wanted his visitors - namely, _him_ - to feel intimidated and nervous, not to mention uncomfortable. He didn't react to Naruto at all, and the blond frowned.

"Hey, Old Man!". Naruto crossed his arms in front of him and tapped his foot against the floor. Sarutobi looked up.

He stopped.

Naruto never realized before what exactly a person looked like when their brain completely and utterly shut down. The pen dropped from old, tobacco-stained lips, falling to the paperwork the other hand completely dropped. The old man's eyes went wide, almost as if he was glancing at a very bright light, and his lips began to move - first, in a subtle tremble that made Naruto revisit his planned paths to the hospital from yesterday, then in a silent litany of words that Naruto completely missed out on. The Sandaime jerked in his chair, first as if he was trying to lean forward, and then sharply backwards as if he couldn't get free of his desk. More paperwork scattered to the floor as the chair scraped on the floor, and Naruto wondered just how many forgotten, lost forms were stuck under the carpet in the reception area, or caught behind cracks in the Hokage's desk.

The Sandaime Hokage came within feet of him before stopping. His eyes were still wide, his wrinkled, spotted face slack in his surprise. Naruto probably would've savored the man's behavior if it weren't for the fact that it seemed that a dozen other people had done the exact same thing since noon.

"Geez. Are you going to have a heart attack, you old coot, or are we gonna have a conversation? Why the hell did you summon me, anyway? Man, "summon" sounds like I'm a servent of yours or something. You know, I was in the middle of training when that huge ANBU interupted me, so you owe me for my time. I'll take cash, checks, or trips to Ichiraku's."

"Naruto," Sarutobi began, his voice as faint as if he were coming from three floors below instead of three feet away, "You've...you're..."

"Damn. Looks like you are having a heart attack. Could you at least wait until you sign a paper saying that you name me your successor before you croak? "Godaime Hokage Uzumaki Naruto" sounds awesome, and hell, I'll get the title early, so I can be Hokage for like, fifty years longer than you."

"Hm," the Sandaime wondered, and Naruto felt complete relief that the old man's voice had gone back to normal. The scene was familiar, comforting, and proof that Naruto wasn't going to have to explain exactly why the Sandaime was dead to his two protective ANBU guards. "No one in Konoha would ever speak to me like that except for you." The Sandaime's deep eyes gazed not just into Naruto's own, but into his _soul_. "You've changed," the old man said finally, and paced back to his desk. He glanced at the piles of paper on the floor with an upraised brow. "There's a seat on the desk. Sit." He stopped and glanced back. "We have much to discuss."

Naruto used one hand to loosen his collar, the oversized sweatshirt suddenly seeming five sizes too tight. He hopped up quickly onto the desk, forcing the Hokage to roll his chair back a few inches as he hung his legs over the side. He kicked them back and forth idly as the Hokage paused dramatically, sucking on his pipe and blowing smoke rings out through his nose.

"I have reports," the legendary shinobi started, and Naruto _knew_ that "reports" couldn't ever be good because if it was documented, it was only done so to be used against you at a later date (case in point, taxes, school grades, and the disciplinary folders with his name on them still at the Academy, _waiting_), "that yesterday, you infiltrated a government office, destroyed property of Konoha, and willfully incapacitated a member of said office." The Sandaime looked down at his paper while Naruto's jaw dropped. "One Amano Ryuuzuki."

"What the _hell?_" Naruto protested, his body stiffening to much that he almost fell off the desk before he adjusted. "Where the heck did you get that crappy information? First off, I didn't "infiltrate" anything. The door was open. I didn't destroy any property of Konoha - I might've just moved crap around a bit, and maybe cut a few boxes up, but I've done worse in the break room here. Finally? Who the hell is this Amano guy? The only person I met yesterday was that stuffy narcoleptic pencil pusher." Naruto paused. "Wait, is _that_ who you mean? Sure, he passed out when I got there, and yeah, he was still out cold when I left, but I had nothing to do with him falling over."

"So, you admit that you were in the BIRCH office yesterday?" Sarutobi pressed.

Naruto nodded. "Nothing secret there. I think those two old guys who were sitting in the lobby saw me. They could probably tell you about me. Well," he paused, "if they're not dead yet, I mean."

"And," the Sandaime continued as if he hadn't heard Naruto speak, "you admit that you did, in your own words, "move crap around", thus organizing the office?"

Naruto's shinobi instincts were telling him that he was in no danger, but the small bones in the knuckles of his hands that twitched whenever hard, heavy work was on the way started to throb. "Well, yeah. I guess I did organize a bit." He stopped. "Oh!" Naruto shouted, smacking his fist on the desk. "I had a note! Kakashi-sensei loaded me up with crap, like his taxes and mission reports and junk, called it training, then slapped that note on the attendant's desk. Well, okay, so he kinda threw it there, but it's the same principle."

The Hokage nodded sagely. "I see. Do you recall what this note said?"

Naruto had to think for a moment. "Well, something about how he, y'know, Kakashi-sensei, authorized me to do paperwork. If you're pissy about the fact that I touched paperwork from, well, a couple decades past, I use the excuse that he didn't say which era's paperwork I had to do, and that I decided to do them all just to be safe. Can't get me on a technicality there, right?" The blond was still proud of his excuse, and the Hokage inhaled deeply, and pressed a small button on his desk.

The pretty young secretary bounced in, almost certainly caught with her ear against the door. She smiled sheepishly at the Sandaime, but her gaze was firmly locked on Naruto. "You wanted something, sir?"

"Bring in Amano Ryuuzuki. There is something I would ask of him." The Sandaime said, dismissing the girl with a wave his his hand. Naruto knew better than to think that the old man's gaze was far off and wistful, when said gaze could _also_ be looking at his secretary's short skirt as she bounced out. Naruto glared.

Amano Ryuuzuki was exactly the same as he had been yesterday, as far as Naruto could remember. Granted, not much of the vast reserves of memory he'd collected yesterday were dedicated to him (the proportion was something along the lines of a speck of rice in an Akimichi banquet), but the slicked hair was the same, and so was the haughty lift of his chin.

"Honorable Sandaime-sama," he began, bowing so deeply that clumps of his hair fell forward, "I am honored that you would summon me before you, and would welcome any service that I could possibly grant one of your-"

"Oh _man,_", Naruto moaned, sliding back on the desk just a few more inches and folding his hands behind his head, "A suck up. I just knew you were - I mean, it takes a special sort of man to slick back his hair like that. By "special", I mean "girly"."

"Hokage-sama!" The man, who suddenly seeemd half his age and eager to tattle to the teacher, practically jumped up, one hand pointing at Naruto. "It's him! He's the one who assaulted me while I valiently attempted to defend the-"

"Assaulted you? Like hell! I didn't ever touch you!." Naruto stopped. "Well, I might've kicked you in the ribs a couple of times after you fainted like a ten-year old civilian girl. But, well, that was just to see if you were sleeping or dead."

The clerk glared. "I distinctly remember your presence before I," and he paused for only the briefest of moments, "sacrificed my conciousness for what was surely for the greater good. As you were the only one present, it must stand that _you_-"

"What about the two old guys?" Naruto protested, his eyebrows furrowing as he glared at the glowering clerk. "And man, that's a crappy reason to accuse somebody. Plus, you got the facts wrong! _Nobody_ assaulted you. You fainted like a wussy, pimply-faced, scared little-"

"Enough." The Hokage's voice cut through Naruto's rapidly rising argument, slicing the air with much more ease and control than Naruto had ever seen when the Sandaime weilded an actual sword. "Now, Amano-san," the Hokage began, and Naruto couldn't decide whether to laugh or scowl some more at the way the clerk almost squealed when Sarutobi called him by name, "it has come to my attention that a detail was left out of your statement. Is it true that there was a note granting Uzumaki-san permission to enter the office and manipulate paperwork?"

Amano's eyebrows furrowed, and he halted whatever words were prepped to fall from his tongue. "I-I'm not sure." He began, and shuffled his feet. "I vaguely remember a shuriken on the desk, and there was something written on the back of a bookstore receipt..." He trailed off.

"Naruto," the Hokage ordered, and the genin stiffened out of reflex, "Please recite what you recall from the letter yesterday. The summary you gave me will do." If Naruto didn't know better, he would've sworn he'd seen a calculating glint in the old man's eye. Because he'd spent the majority of his life around that same man, he actually _did_ know better, and turned back towards the clerk uneasily.

"Well, it was something along the lines of "I, Hatake Kakashi-" He was cut off by a squeal, and watched in nothing short of awe as Amano placed his hand against his forehead, moaned, and collapsed on the floor with a loud "thump". There was no way it could possibly be called anything but "swooning".

Naruto twitched. "What the _hell_?" He shook his head briskly. "Well, at least you know that I didn't do nothing to him." He turned back towards Sarutobi, who was massaging his forehead with one hand while the other tapped out the used contents of his pipe.

"I should've known it was _that_ Amano." Naruto glared at him, and the old man finally sighed. "You know, of course, that the current Team Seven is the first group of genin that has ever passed Kakashi's rigorous standards?" He continued without seeing Naruto's nod. "Your sensei has "elected" to be eligible as an instructor for genin for the last seven years. This means that, given the fact that the Academy has promotion exams at the end of the Fall and Springs semesters, Kakashi Hatake has failed thirteen teams." He glanced up into Naruto's eyes. "Amano Ryuuzuki has been on ten of these."

Sarutobi calmly refilled his pipe with pungent green weed while Naruto twitched, his mouth trying to find words that didn't exist. Finally, Naruto spoke. "Wow. That has to be the single worst luck I've ever heard of. I mean, I thought I was bad for failing the Academy's test _three_ times, but-"

"No, Amano passed the Academy test each and every time he took it with outstanding grades. Granted, his taijutsu scores were below average, but these were supplemented by his extraordinary grasp of genjutsu. It was the team selection exam which he failed. I believe you called it the "Bell Test"."

Naruto stopped. "You mean that, after ten tries, he _still_ didn't get the whole "teamwork" thing that Kakashi preaches?" Naruto leaned back. "Wow. I mean, even _I_ would've gotten it eventually. 'Course, if Sakura-chan had been tied up, I would've gotten it straight out."

"And if it had been Uchiha Sasuke?" the Sandaime asked.

Naruto scowled. "That bastard? I probably would've failed a couple more times. But, I mean, probably not ten. Eventually, I'd just have to be paired up with people I could stand, though. But, hey, what's with this guy fainting? What's his bad record got to do with anything?"

"After the tenth attempt, Amano went into ...well, I will spare you the details, but he spent the next few months recooperating in the Mental Health ward of the Hospital. There, he was classified with what equates to a pathelogical fear of Hatake Kakashi."

Naruto blinked. "Y-you're not kidding me?" The Sandaime shook his head. "Whoa. So, when he hears Kakashi's name, he always faints?"

Sarutobi grunted. "In the past few years of intensive couselling, progress _has_ been made. While you might see fainting as a weakness, Amano has greatly improved from his previous behavior, which was primarily spent curling into a ball and weeping hysterically whenever Kakashi was mentioned."

"...Hey, Old Man," Naruto began, leaning towards the Sandaime while resting one arm across his lap, "Are you sure that guy's still a guy? Doesn't that pretty much invalidate the "M" symbol on his shinobi license?" He paused. "Wait, I didn't think genin could work around classified documents without permission. If he never passed the tests, you know, because of Kakashi and then because of the whole "crazy" thing, how was he working in BIRCH, anyway?"

Naruto immediately knew that he was on the right track because Sarutobi looked uncomfortable, and tapped his pipe against the desk loudly.

"Because of his ...condition, certain allowances were made. None of them," he emphasized as he saw Naruto's mouth wide with silent screams of indignation, "were in any way privledges or favors. His is marked as Chuunin because he met a rigerous series of ...tests that proved his ability to function as a ninja."

Naruto sagged, and nodded. The blond had decided long ago that Sarutobi had a special, secret bloodline limit that gave him the incredible power of knowing exactly what to say in every circumstance imaginable. Somehow, he always knew exactly how to explain things so that it didn't end in bloodshed, knew how to negotiate with his advisors and with foreign shinobi, and knew just the right way to put things in writing so that thinly veiled insults didn't end in war. Despite all this, he still couldn't talk to women. Of the two special abilities, Naruto was positive about which one _he'd_ choose.

For once, Naruto didn't mind the silence. Sarutobi loved to bask in the complete quiet, especially when that "complete quiet" meant that he had to do no paperwork. Instead, the two ninja sat calmly, Naruto only kicking the Sandaime's chair, fiddling with papers with one hand as he whistled a tune idly.

"You seem content today, my boy." The Sandaime remarked. The old man had the occasional habit of glancing at the ceiling when he was talking to Naruto, and the genin had the occasional habit of climbing up to the ceiling and staring down at him in return. Today, however, Naruto shrugged.

"It was a good day. I had tons of food, and Sakura-chan told me that she _knew_ I would totally win in this contest I had with the Bastard, and I actually _did_ win, old man! It was completely awesome, and you really should've been there. And I-" Naruto stopped, slack jawed in the middle of a sentence. The Sandaime quickly glanced at him, and Naruto reeled in his jaw, turning his head away in an instant. "And I had a good cup of coffee on the way here." He finished, wincing as soon as he said it. It sounded completely unbelievable even to his own ears, but it was better than the truth by a thousand miles.

The notebook at his side weighed three thousand pounds, and it was bursting with questions that Naruto really wanted to know and couldn't ask. He knew he couldn't talk about Makoto and Haruka at all. Yet. Kakashi had been proof that every shinobi with a shred of sense would suspect new family members showing up. Makoto had been right when she'd said that he was an extraordinary person to not do so the day before (Sakura would call him "extraordinarily stupid").

The two topics which fought for the inside of his mind were the Kyuubi and his father, and Naruto knew that few people existed who could know more about either than the Sandaime. Sarutobi would be able to tell him about his father's genin days - who his teacher was, if he _ever_ managed to do badly at a test, what he was like as a child - far better than Makoto could, as she said that he'd only started appearing once he was around chuunin level or higher. The Sandaime would also know about the battle with the fox, and was possibly the only person in Konoha that could tell him about it and not get capital punishment for it.

"The Kyuubi", Naruto muttered, and he hadn't known he'd said it outloud until he felt the old man's gaze firmly locked on him. "Oh, hell. I said that outloud, didn't I? Dammit."

Sarutobi's eyes bore straight through Naruto, burning small smoking holes into the wall behind him. "Naruto, explain." The blonde never wanted to know about Sarutobi's special vocal intimidation jutsu more than he had at that moment, mainly because of the fact that if he knew about it, he could actually formulate something to counter-act it. As it was, however, the Sandaime's tone alone was a command, and Naruto was following through on it before he knew what he was saying.

"Well, I mean, I just wanted to know about ...you know, the night the Kyuubi attacked." The answering silence in the room was thicker than pipe smoke and smelled foul, and Naruto forced his mouth to continue on because even blurting out his secret, forbidden questions was better than being surrounded by the Sandaime's own brand of discomfort. "You don't have to look at me like that, you know." Naruto glared, but broke off after a minute. Sarutobi _always_ won staring contests. "Alright, I'll spill. See, yesterday, when I was doing paperwork, I found this scroll."

Sarutobi shifted, and Naruto knew that was the shinobi equivelent of bolting upright and gasping in awe. "Oh, a scroll? What did it look like?"

Naruto squrimed. Shinobi were _supposed_ to hide their emotions and involuntary reflexes to lie and decieve better, but frankly, he never held with such nonsense. It had nothing to do with the fact that Sarutobi had, from day one, always known when he was lying, as if Naruto glowed bright pink whenever a fib left his tongue. "Well, okay. It was a map of Konoha. Really cool, actually, and it was done by the Yondaime."

"Oh?" Sandaime pressed, one hand moving up to cover his face, hiding what Naruto could just _feel_ was a satisfied grin, "How did you know that it was written by the Yondaime, Naruto?"

"Er, well, I was going through paperwork before, and there was this paper written by a "Kazama Arashi". This guy had some of the crappiest handwriting ever - even worse than Kurenai on Team 8, and you have to know how bad that is - and I had to take some time to read it to figure out where exactly to stick the paper." He paused. It was a half-truth, and it convieniently left out the fact that it was the sort of paperwork he'd been looking for in the first place. "Anyway, I was looking through another shelf, and there was this scroll, sealed in a leather case."

"If it was sealed," the Sandaime asked innocently, "How did you open it? What did this seal look like, exactly?"

"Well, it was a red, waxy seal, with designs in it." He stopped. If he said that he knowingly opened a sealed document from one of the Hokage's, he would probably get into real trouble, usually defined as "jail time" but possibly branching off into "spending a week in the Interrogation Unit". "I don't remember opening it," he said cautiously, and as soon as it fell off his tongue, he realized that he really _didn't_ remember opening it, "So, it probably was already opened before I got there." He smirked, satisfied at the answer.

The Sandaime nodded. "Hm. And you said a map was in there?" Before Naruto could answer, the Sandaime pressed a button on his desk. His secretary came rushing in, and he beckoned for one of the ANBU guards who peeked through the enterance after her. "In the BIRCH office, there will be a leather scroll case with a red seal. Bring it to me with as much haste as possible." The ANBU nodded quickly, and was gone before Naruto could close his mouth. The first man who ever acknowledged him glanced at him, beckoning with one hand. "Continue."

"Eh, well. First off, I knew that Kazama Arashi wrote it, because the handwriting was just as illegible. He had a great sense of humor, by the way.On the map, it showed all of Konoha, except that it was Konoha from, you know, twelve years ago. Just a couple of days from before I was born, and before ...the Kyuubi. Anyway," he continued, bringing one hand up sharply to scratch the back of his head, "there were entire complexes of familes I've never heard of, huge compounds like the Hyuugas have, except I've never even seen one of 'em. It got me to thinking that the Kyuubi, well, he did all of that. And, for the first time, I kinda understood all the hatred, you know? I mean, I'm just surprised that I wasn't...". He trailed off. The Sandaime probably didn't want to hear all the details about his past, especially because he probably knew them all already, and understood. "It's just that, looking at that map put it all into-" he stopped, glancing at the ceiling and biting his lip subconciously, "'perspective'. Yeah, that's the word I'm looking for. I just, well, understood _most_ of what they did, and well, this is gonna sound really corny, but I _forgave_ them."

Naruto sighed heavily, dropping both hands onto the desk with a weighty knock. "But, someone important told me recently that you can't really forgive anyone until you know everything about a situation." He couldn't help but recall the way Haruka looked as she told him that, a strange mixture of determination and saddness in her eyes. Somehow, she knew exactly what he was going through, down to the smallest detail without even knowing about what she meant. "It's just like if somone does something to do you, you're just stupid to hate them until you know exactly why they did exactly what they did. I realized that the villagers were doing that, because they hated me, and they thought their children to do the same. That makes all the village children stupid - including Sasuke, which I knew all along- and I didn't want to be like them. I wanted to learn more about why things are the way they are for me. I wanted to know more about the Kyuubi," he began, and waited a telling moment before exhaling, "and the Yondaime."

His hands were everywhere while the Sandaime enjoyed smoking his pipe and stretching out the moment as long as he could. Naruto scowled while his hands bunched in fists on his knees, scratched at his eyebrow, and tugged at the strap of his courier's bag. There was a poorly muffled sound of surprise, and Naruto jerked his head up to find the Sandaime wearing the same frozen expression of awe he'd had on what seemed like hours before. Naruto had to follow the Sandaime's eyes to his hands, where a silver ring caught the electric lights of the Hokage's office.

"Oh, hell! I forgot I put this on yesterday." Naruto frowned. "Wait, I took a shower and everything! How the hell did I miss that? How did everyone else miss it-" He halted, because the Sandaime was forcing his hands to unfurl.

Sarutobi had crooked fingers covered in calluses and innumberable papercut scars. Liver spots and moles seeded his skin, and Naruto had, on a few memorable occassions, connected the dots to play a few games of tic-tac-toe with himself. The fact that he'd done so with permenant marker earned him the punishment of cutting all the hedges on the Hokage's property. Naruto, at the time, hadn't known that the Hokage's property included the only hedge-maze in Konoha, and had spent three weeks in the middle of summer roasting in his skin in the outdoors. The old man's skin was dry, covered in wrinkles, and had always radiated heat like a second sun. In some winters, Naruto had warmed his hands by rubbing them on the Sandaime's balding head, an act which _also_ gave him his choice of punishment, usually involving a chore around the Sandaime's house that needed to be done, like Asuma's laundry or the reorganization of Sarutobi's dirty magazines..

For a moment, all that either ninja could look at was the signet ring on Naruto's finger. The blond felt a new awe for it because not only had the Yondaime, his old idol, worn it, but his _father_ had worn it. The Sandaime turned his hand this way and that, raising it up to see the intricate spiral design.

"Let me guess," the Sandaime muttered with a small smile tugging at his lips, "the Seal looked exactly like this?"

Naruto stopped. "I can't incriminate myself, right? I can pretend not to know?"

The old man sighed heavily and shook his head slowly. "It doesn't work when you ask that before you lie, Naruto. Just tell me the truth - it will never leave this office."

"Right. Well, okay, I _did_ recognize the seal on the scroll as being from the Hokage's office. Hell, I tried to snatch yours enough that I knew what it looked like, if not this design. I figured that if it were from the Shodaime or Nidaime's reign, it'd be written on clay tablets or something, and I knew it wasn't your design. So, process of elimination proved it was the Yondaime's. Now, his handwriting really _is_ identical to Kazama Arashi's, which I said before. So, it kinda stands to reason that they're the same person." He glanced at Sarutobi, who was nodding. There wasn't anger on his face, which gave Naruto enough cause to finally exhale. "Anyway, I guess I tried on this ring and forgot about it." He paused. "I really can't say why."

A slow smile tugged at Sarutobi's thin, dry lips, and Naruto watched as enlightenment revealed itself to the Old Man. Naruto tried to follow the man's train of thought. He was shocked when Naruto showed up in new clothes, shocked when Naruto had the ring, and shocked when he mentioned the Kyuubi, and about wanting to know about the Yondaime. Sarutobi would've known the Yondaime, and was probably old enough to have seen him when he was a genin. From all of Makoto's pictures and stories, he _highly_ resembled his father. If he was right about all of this, Naruto concluded with a weight in his belly, the Sandaime had just figured out that he was the Yondaime's son.

"It fits," Sarutobi stated after fifteen eternities passed, "like it was meant to be there." He released his grip on Naruto's hand and drew back in his chair.

Naruto couldn't squash his feeling of dissapointment. Sarutobi _knew_ that Naruto was the Yondaime's son. He knew that Naruto knew about the Yondaime's previous name, and most likely knew that he was too damn stubborn not to pursue the matter further, now that he had a foot in the door. This was the perfect opportunity for the old man to work it into conversation, the best segue that could ever exist for something this big. If Naruto hadn't already known from Makoto, he would've been incredibly confused, but instead, the dissapointment swirling in his belly surged into anger.

Sarutobi had no right to keep knowledge like this from him - keep facts about his _family_ away from him. As far as Sarutobi knew, Naruto _didn't_, and still, he wasn't saying anything.

Naruto couldn't say that he lost trust in Sarutobi, because the trust between them had been forged over the span of Naruto's entire life, day after day, and act after act of kindness, honesty, and respect from both sides. It had been tested by arguments, fueds, pranks, punishments, and stern lectures to the point where Naruto thought nothing could destroy it. But, the idea that there could be other things that Sarutobi knew and didn't share, things that could change Naruto's life, felt like it was acid eating away on the very chain between them.

"Knowledge," Sarutobi began, blowing out a cloud of smoke as he exhaled, "is the single most dangerous tool of a shinobi. You've heard the old adege "Knowledge is Power"? In my experience, there has never been a truth so aptly seized by Man. I have seen the best of men lust for knowledge, grab at it with mortal hands. and fall beneath the title of "human" because of acts of cruelty I only wish I could bleach from my memory. I have seen the wisest shinobi, ones with greater potential than can be put into words, fall from grace because you see, Naruto, power destroys. In it's rawest form, it yearns to consume and destroy like a sentinent being. Ask yourself this again. What exactly will you do with this knowledge you seek - this knowledge about the Kyuubi ...and other matters."

Naruto scrunched his eyebrows, his hands halting while his mind struggled with the concept. He wanted to know more about the night of his birth, and the final night of the Kyuubi's attack. He wanted to know about why his father died, and what other options were there, if any. He _needed_ to know what his father knew, and if he ever thought he'd be pushing Naruto into the figural den of lions.

What he couldn't see was how the answers to any of these could corrupt or destroy him. He already knew that Arashi - his father - had been a good man, so he knew half the answers to his questions already. The Yondaime wouldn't just throw the first baby he found at the Kyuubi and hope for the best. He would have researched the Kyuubi, the seal, and what it would do to the child - him - before. Well, Naruto conceeded, that was in the ideal circumstance. Naruto knew that whenever _he_ was in battle, he tended to wing it in lieu of a plan. Even outside of battle, as proven by that morning's conversation with Makoto, he tended to go with whatever worked at the time, hoping that he'd be lucky enough that things would work out.

Perhaps the Yondaime's luck had just run out.

"I'm not sure what you expect me to do with what I learn. I mean, I can't change how the Yondaime died, I can't change how the Kyuubi destroyed the town, and I can't change how I got to be the way I am now." He glanced at Sarutobi, whose face was perfectly neutral, as if it were carved from the same stone as the Monument. "I just want to learn about it. I mean, knowledge is just knowledge. I kinda figure that if a person wants power through the whole "knowledge" path, they really have to be evil _before_ they search for it. It's not like knowledge can be evil - it's just a thing. But, hell, don't you think it's kinda weird that for the first time, I actually _do_ want to learn something about history, and you're asking me if I really want to go through with it? You should be ...I don't know, having a heart attack or throwing a party or something."

The Sandaime's lips quirked, and then he turned, and then the old man was cackling off to the side in exactly the same manner of Makoto the day before. He turned back to Naruto, a familiar, almost doting grin on his face. "Good answer. That'll work for now. Alright, Naruto!" He crowed, leaning forward on his elbows as he grinned at Naruto, "I have a proposition for you."

"Eh?" Naruto leaned _back_ in his chair. Whenever the Sandaime smiled like _that_, evil, horrible, manipulative things waited in dark corners of his future to rob him of his free time and energy.

"I have a very special mission here. No one in Konoha even dares to attempt it any more, but I believe that _you_ are capable of succeeding where others have failed. It is a long-term mission usually assigned to C-rank shinobi, but because of certain aspects of the job, the classification and payment of it are B-ranked. It is a solo mission, and no other members of your team need be involved in it. While the mission itself is not a secret, I would request that you keep any and all information you may gain through your efforts to yourself as much as possible. This is the only time I will offer this to you, Naruto. Will you accept this mission?"

Naruto's teeth felt like they would break in half because he was smiling so hard. He bolted out of his chair, leaning over the Hokage's desk, propping himself up with his arms to face the old man. "Is it very dangerous? Aw, hell, I don't need to know. You had me as soon as you said that Sasuke's not invited to do it. Count me in!"

"Excellent! Report to this address at seven tomorrow." The Hokage scribbled a collection of numbers and letters that might've been words onto a scrap of paper with a pleased "I have you now!" smirk creeping across his face and into Naruto's gut, where the feeling just creeped. "It _is_ dangerous, depending on how well you do at the job." Before Naruto could question, the Hokage raised one wizzened hand and continued. "You'll find out tomorrow. But, you're doing a great service for your fellow shinobi, your team, and your village."

The bones in his knuckles were throbbing against his hand now in a mockery of a heartbeat. From the small bones in his foot to the very roof his mouth, Naruto felt a chorus within his own body. He'd just signed up for hard, heavy work, and _nothing_ in his body was pleased about it.

The Sandaime was _humming_ as he filled out a few more sheets of paper that to anyone else (and, quite possibly Sarutobi as well) would've seemed completely random. He glanced up through the edge of his hat at Naruto. "Shouldn't you be getting some rest for your big day tomorrow? Why, very few shinobi at your age get solo missions. Perhaps you should call on Ichiraku's to celebrate..."

"Mmm, Ramen." Despite himself, Naruto found one hand moving towards his stomach. The fact that it was still (moderately) full jolted him out of his reverie. "Hey! You can't just dismiss me like that!"

"Oh, you're still here? I hadn't noticed..." Sarutobi glanced up with a patient, doting, utterly sacrine smile.

Naruto frowned. "Bastard. I don't know what you're plotting, but I'm not leaving here until I get an answer."

The old man actually looked confused. "About the Kyuubi?"

Naruto shook his head violently, and he stuck one pointed finger within inches of Sarutobi's face. "Nope! I know I'll learn about the Kyuubi soon enough, even if I have to ask the bastard himself." Sarutobi went pale. "Hey, I didn't mean it like that. Anyway, you _have_ to answer this one, alright?"

Sarutobi sighed and smiled, color drifting it's way back into his cheeks again. He nodded. "Go ahead."

"Why the _hell_ are you hiring crazy people to do your office work?"

Sarutobi seemed to choke, and his eyes went wide. "What?"

"That new chick - your secretary - is _insane_." Naruto leaned forward over the desk, knocking over the small tilting-bird apparatus that had fascinated him until he turned eleven. "On the way in here, she _squealed_ when she saw me. Hell, she called me "Uzumaki-sama" and "Sir"! Something is _wrong_ with that woman."

"Naruto," he laughed, "you have a fangirl."

"Exactly! She's insane! You need to seriously review your hiring process here, because it's not enough that you made Maito Gai a _teacher_, you had to have a crazy person as a secretary, too."

"It's never a dull moment with you around, boy. I guarantee that you will learn exactly _why_ you have a fangirl tomorrow. But, I'll give you this: Finally, you're getting proper recognition for one of your acts."

Naruto scowled. "That doesn't help at all! I'm staying here until I get so- Did you just fall asleep?"

Sarutobi rolled his head back in his chair, snoring loudly enough that Naruto's cries of indignation couldn't be heard. Naruto knew, Sarutobi knew, and the four ANBU watching the Hokage's office from the next rooftop over knew that the Sandaime was faking it.

"Bastard." Naruto resisted the urge to spit on the Hokage's floor, as the last time he'd done so, the Hokage had invited all of ANBU to do the same, then left Naruto to clean up the mess. He'd rather get the crap kicked out of him by Sasuke than go through that again. As it was, Naruto scowled even more at Sarutobi, crammed the slip of paper with the mission's location into his courier's bag, and stomped over to the door.

Sarutobi stopped snoring and started shifting papers before Naruto could even open the door.

"Oh, I'm still asleep," he called, "It's just a form of sleep-walking I developed in my tenth year of my first reign..."

Naruto walked out, not caring that the way he slammed the door startled the ANBU into jumping three feet, and almost missing the fact that the secretary leaned close to him as he passed through the "NITOR" door and shoved a piece of paper into his hand with a wink.

He was so intent on storming out of the building, leaping to the rooftop across from the Hokage's office, and making faces at Sarutobi behind his back that Naruto didn't realize he was being followed until the secretary's note was plucked from his hand.

Kakashi read over it once, his eye suddenly widening, "In a couple of years, call me - I'll be looking forward to it. Love, your biggest fan."

Naruto glanced up to find Kakashi staring at him, one eye wide, Sakura gaping, and Sasuke brooding in a dramatic pose.

"Oh, hell," he managed. "I forgot about you guys."

* * *

The trip back to Naruto's apartment was brief, as the whole of Team Seven was large enough that they were permitted to use the express, group-lane of the Shinobi Highway and Transit System. The trip _was_ quick, but every step that brought Naruto closer to his own house compounded his misery until he had to drag himself to the front of his door. 

There was the chance that Kakashi would see something he didn't like about Makoto and Haruka and take them hostage or worse, the chance that Makoto and Haruka would be so mortified by Sasuke's horrible manners that they'd disown Naruto to get away from all brooding ninja, and the chance that Makoto would leave after seeing Sakura swoon into Naruto's arms, confident that he would have the love of a woman for the rest of his life.

It was with dread that Naruto found himself knocking on his own front door for the first time in his life. He gestured for Kakashi-sensei and his team mates to stand out of sight, and watched as the door flew open.

"Naruto-kun!" Haruka slammed into him like an Akimichi, and, even loaded down with fifteen extra pounds of weapons and armor, he still lost balance. He managed to straighten before he completely embarrassed himself, a valient effort that was soon completely invalidated as Haruka kissed his cheeks. "I got a job! It's nearby, pays well, and I can start tomorrow!" She kissed him a few more times, and Naruto was almost positive that she _giggled_. "Welcome home."

"It's good to be home." He couldn't help but smile, because for once, the truth didn't hurt at all. The dread inside of him lifted as he watched Haruka's smile and the dimples in her cheeks. "Aunt Haruka," he hesitated, adding the title for effect as he glanced at his side, "could you tell Grandma that I have a couple of guests?"

Haruka straightened at once, her mouth forming a perfect "o" for a moment. "Oh! Oh, goodness." She glanced around quickly, and Naruto didn't have a clue what she was looking for. She blushed beet red, and bowed deeply towards where Kakashi-sensei and his team were lurking (Naruto was pretty sure he saw incredulous expresions on every one of their faces) before darting back inside. She shut the door behind her.

There was a complete moments pause, interupted periodically by crashing sounds from inside his apartment, thinly muffled curses, and the occasional thump of loud footsteps on the floor.

"Kakashi-sensei," Sasuke began, "I believe that we _must_ be in the presence of a spy."

Sakura snorted off to his side, and when Kakashi and Naruto both turned to watch her, she blushed and straightened out her skirt. "She seems very ...nice, Naruto." She seemed as if she had been searching for a proper word for much longer than the brief hesitation, but Naruto took the compliment as it was.

"Yep! She has this great sense of humor, too, but I guess she gets kinda weird around strangers." Absently, he rubbed his cheek where she had kissed him, and drew back his hand. _He_ didn't notice the grin, but his team mates glanced among themselves. He paused. "Don't you _dare_ scare her, Kakashi-sensei. Don't hit on her, or make fun of her, or ...you know it might just be easier if you pretend to be someone else."

Kakashi actually looked hurt, ridiculous puppy eye glistening with fake tears as his jaw seemed to tremble, one hand pointing to his face as if asking "who, me?". "You don't want me to act like myself?"

There was a concensus of "No!", "It's for the best, really," and "Hn." from his crowd. Kakashi sniffed loudly.

"Well, I suppose I'll have to act like someone else. Hmmm, who to choose... I know - how about Maito Gai?"

Sakura paled, Sasuke's eyes widened in horror, and Kakashi didn't have time to blink before Naruto was glaring up at him. "If you do, I'll rip out all the smut scenes from your books and replace them with pictures of Sarutobi's trip to the beach."

Kakashi stopped. "You wouldn't dare."

"Are you sure you want to risk it?" Naruto wasn't tall enough to reach Kakashi's ear, but the older man still caught the genin's whisper. "Sarutobi wore a speedo."

Kakashi's eye widened and twitched, jaw trembling as the image sifted through his eyes and sank into his brain. "You...you _monster_."

Off to the side, Sasuke and Sakura sweat dropped. Naruto glared at their teacher while Kakashi stood as still as a corpse, the occassional tic of his eye a sign that he hadn't gone into a coma. Sakura finally stepped forward. "I'm sure that what Naruto means is that we _all_ should be on our best behavior." For some reason, she glared at Naruto.

The door flew open, startling all three genin and waking the jonin from his living death. Haruka panted at the edge of it, and Naruto actually wasn't sure how long he'd been waiting, but it absolutely couldn't be enough time for Haruka to change out of the wrinkled, washed out shirt and pants she had been wearing into a smooth, boldly colored skirt, with a wide-sleeved blouse similiar to what she'd worn the night before. Her hair had been brushed so that it seemed like it haloed her head, and she'd managed to put on a light layer of make up that brought out the color of her eyes.

Naruto grinned. "You look beautiful, but you really didn't need to change to manage that. You could be wearing a burlap sack and still manage to look gorgeous."

Haruka blinked, and Naruto was almost certain he saw Sakura's head slowly rotate in his direction. "Thank you for the compliment, Naruto-kun. Ah!" Her gasp startled Naruto, and the younger blonde glanced around for the inevitable ninja attack. "I haven't introduced myself. I am Haruka, Naruto's aunt." She bowed deeply again, and before Naruto could tell her that bowing really wasn't necessary, she ushered him inside.

There was immediately a three-ninja pile-up in the doorway.

What Naruto saw was the same spotless, glistening floor as when he left, the same tidy bed as when he woke up, and the same clean, sparkling table. The tea set on it looked new, though Naruto vaguely remembered using his kettle as a ramen bowl once. Steam piped out of six already poured cups, a small plate of delicious looking pastries sat in the center of the table. Makoto sat at one corner of the table, looking for all the world like the most beautiful woman in history.

What his _team mates _saw had to be completely different, because Kakashi's eye began twitching, Sakura's jaw dropped, and Sasuke's head was actually swivelling in all directions, as if he was trying to find somewhere to pose dramatically, and found every spot warmed by a friendly, hospitable atmosphere that completely ruined his mood. Sakura was the first one to squirm out of the doorway, with Sasuke popping out through her efforts, while Kakashi forgot to duck and slammed his forehead against the doorway.

"Heh, that's what you get for being so freakishly tall." Naruto grinned, but whipped his head around when he heard a disaproving noise from Makoto.

"Your grandfather was tall, Naruto, and your father was even more so. I have a feeling that you'll be just as tall as your sensei here, if not more. Well," she finished, sipping some of her tea, "as long as you keep eating your vegetables. Now, come here and kiss me?"

The request on the end of it completely shot down any and all protests Naruto could have made. He couldn't help but walk over, awkwardly wrapping his arms around her shoulders in a failed hug that somehow still seemed to work. Her hair smelled like vanilla, and he kissed her cheek, getting his bony nose everywhere. "Hi, Grandma." The name _still_ tasted foreign in his mouth, but he couldn't keep anything but good thoughts in his head while he said it, as if every bad memory he'd ever had never existed in the first place, or happened to some poor sap named "Naruko", and not to him.

He glanced up, and he realized that his team was staring at him. "Oh, hell! This is my Grandma, Makoto. She's the most awesome woman ever, and she's really young, so don't screw up there like I did. Insult her and die, Sasuke."

The Uchiha glared at Naruto, who promptly glared back, but before the situation could escalate any further, Makoto slowly eased out of her sitting position, as graceful as if she spent fifteen years in finishing school, majoring soley in chairs. She stepped towards the dark haired boy, and Naruto snickered as Sasuke took an involuntary step backwards. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Sasuke. Uchiha, correct? Naruto's spoken of you a great deal." She paused. "I'm sure that most of it had to be exaggeration. Such a sweet looking boy couldn't deserve your reputation."

Sakura beside him snickered, but she straightened up as stiffly as if she were in front of the Hokage as Makoto approached her. She bowed awkwardly, and Naruto wondered if the whole bowing thing was a thing from where Makoto and Haruka were from, and how Sakura knew about it. "Ah! It's an honor to actually meet some of Naruto's family. I wasn't actually aware that he had any until today."

Makoto smirked. "Naruto only beat you out by a day. It's no wonder Naruto had such a way around girls, when he's around one as lovely as you."

There was massive silence from all parties who actually knew better.

Kakashi kept glancing from Naruto to Makoto, and then back again. His eyes darted to the white, stainless ceiling now free of stray, stuck-on ramen noodles and the odd over-achieving fork, then to the closet that shut for the first time, and then to the kitchen that, for the first time, didn't smell as if it belonged in the Nara's slaughterhouse. If Naruto didn't know better, he would've said that the jonin was completely and utterly dumbstruck.

Makoto glided over to him, and it didn't matter that she was wearing a familiar pair of plain white pants - she seemed to be wearing an evening gown, or the most beautiful kimono in the world. "You must be Naruto's teacher. I must thank you for taking such good care of him. He's already so grown up." Her voice might've cracked at the end of the sentence, but she had a smile on her face, so Naruto was thoroughly confused as to what to do. Kakashi looked as if he wanted to say something, but instead silently inclined his head. For some reason, Makoto beamed as if he'd presented her with a bouquet of flowers with chocolates on the side.

His grandmother craned her head towards him, and Naruto saw the smile on her face falter. "I'm afraid I have some bad news to temper these joyful introductions."

Naruto had to wonder at the use of "joyful", because there wasn't much joy involved, though there was a great and huge abundance of silence, awkward silence, and the odd and rare "companiable" silence that passed between Makoto and Haruka quite often. More than that, he wondered at what could actually be "bad news". Makoto and Haruka were both alive, not bleeding, and were happy. _He_ had nearly hit his record number for fewest wounds recieved in a day, had eaten, and had actually managed not to insult the Hokage more than usual. There was electricity in the apartment, everyone was clothed, and no one was killing each other yet. Naruto raised an eyebrow.

"You'd better sit down for this, dear." Makoto rushed him to a chair at the end of the table, and before he knew it - or, any of the others - Makoto had seated them all around the table, somehow navigating it so that Kakashi and Sasuke, the most paranoid of the group, had full view of the door with one eye and full view of the windows with the other (in Sasuke's case), while Sakura was just inches away from the cookie plate. She hurried off to the bathroom, where there was the faint smell of smoke that utterly confused Naruto, while Haruka busied herself running between the kitchen and the living room, fetching what Naruto realized with detached horror were coasters.

Kakashi hadn't touched his tea, but somehow, the water level in the cup was slowly lowering, and Kakashi actually asked for a refill when Haruka passed by again. She hesitated. "You don't have family around the Land of Rock, do you?"

Somehow, Kakashi's eye turned hard. "No."

Haruka turned around, meekly answering. "I see. I just thought you looked familiar."

Naruto had never wanted to kick his sensei in the teeth before. Well, quite as badly as he did at that time.

Makoto finally returned, and Naruto's curiosity was officially peaked because she was carrying a medium sized box that was apparently heavy, by the way she had positioned it in her arms. Before Naruto could get out of his seat to help her with it, Kakashi had already made the trip, and the kyuubi-vessel officially removed one teeth-kick from his "Things I'm Going to Do to Kakashi" list.

The box sat in the middle of the table, smelling strongly of smoke. Makoto turned to him and nodded. "I'm sorry, Naruto."

Sakura had pressed against Sasuke in what was surely _only_ an attempt to see what was going on. Judging by the way the dark haird boy's eyes were darting towards the windows, the doors, and the kitchen, the Uchiha was trying desperately to think of a reason to leave Naruto's apartment right away, most likely to get away from a group of people that numbered more than four, especially as said group had a balanced number of females. Kakashi-sensei's hands were fidgeting in front of his face, adjusting his mask, his headband, and pockets of his vest, which he kept unbuttoning and refastening. Naruto realized that his teacher was desperately trying to resist the urge to read Icha Icha in front of his grandmother, and Naruto felt a deep sense of overwhelming pride, which _almost_ masked the sense of fear the box instilled.

Slowly, he pressed his hand against the lid of the box, which was strangely warm. He carefully lifted up the lid, turning his head and wrinkling his nose as the smell of smoke, ash, and burning leather itched at his eyes and nose.

It _had_ been his orange jumpsuit. Now, it was charred black and brown, with only scraps of his favorite color still showing. The small leather details were chared, eaten away like acid had gone through them. The dangling hooks and hidden pockets were rendered useless, and, as Naruto lifted his outfit out of it's grave with nothing less than horror, even the back, swirling crest he'd taken as his own looked beyond repair.

"W-who would do such a thing?" Naruto felt tears glisten in his eyes. Despite the fact that Sakura was here, despite the fact that _Sasuke_ was here, he couldn't help but feel the urge to either punch a hole through the wall of cry on someone's shoulder. "What sort of monster would do this?"

"I'm not sure, Naruto. I had hung it out with the rest of your clothes to dry, and all I saw was a dark blur, and then I heard the sound of explosions, and some sort of metallic swooshing noise. I had to pull a few dozen throwing stars out of this, but I managed to put out the flames quickly enough to save what's left."

As he wiped his eyes on the sleeve of his unfamiliar, alien, sweatshirt, he saw Kakashi sweat drop, Sakura blink rapidly, and Sasuke snort and look away.

"It's not like it's that bad, right Naruto?" Sakura asked. "It was just an outfit, and it was incredibly ugly, anyway. You're better off without it." There was a small smile on her face and a gentle look in her eyes. If she had been trying to cheer him up, she apparently had no grasp of how to actually console people. He feared for any small children she ever spoke to, any elderly she ever passed near, and any person who ever tried to make contact with her, because she was either an evil, souless demon who prayed on peoples sorrow, or more socially awkward than _Sasuke_, who hadn't said a word about the jumpsuit yet. Naruto fiercely resisted the urge to bare his fangs and snarl at her. Instead, he fisted handfuls of what fabric remained of the back crest.

"This was made for me - for _me - _ by a man named Shigure. He was an old tailor with one arm and one eye. This was the first gift anyone ever gave me. It was _not_ ugly." Naruto had managed to keep his tone level through the whole explanation, even though "level" included taking deep breaths after every sentence.

There was a pause, and Sakura looked towards Kakashi, as if for guidance. The silver-haired man looked away briefly. "Well," he started, "you could have the same guy fix it, or make you another one." He paused. "One in another color, like dark blue, or a green that would actually camoflague, or a traditional, sound black..."

"He died before I became a Genin."

There was silence.

"Oh."

"I think," Makoto stated firmly, suddenly standing behind Naruto, easily navigating the jumpsuit out of his hands, "that I can salvage this back part, with the cute Fishcake spiral? My, that was clever of him. Yes, and if I can't I can certainly try my hand at making a new one." She realized that all eyes were on her, and smiled demurely. "It's been years since I've done it as a profession, but in my village, I was occasionally called upon to make repairs to clothing, or to darn the occasional sock, or to fix the occasional tear in a battle suit." Sasuke and Kakashi both glanced at her, but Sakura's gaze was firmly fastened to the table. "My husband, Toppu, was a mercenary for quite some time, and in those decades, he made an awful mess of his clothes."

Haruka snorted. "It probably would've been worse if he wore more than just pants when he went into battle, Mother."

Makoto cradled the side of her head with one hand, an expression of surprise passing her lips before it morphed into something dreamy. "Oh yes, I had forgotten about how many shirts he went through before he gave up on them entirely. That was a good day."

Kakashi, Sasuke, and Naruto's eyes met for the briefest moment. In that moment, they shared the communal thought of "I don't want to know".

Makoto straightened. "Oh! Forgive the musings of this old woman." She ignored Naruto's protests of "I know better than to ever call you old again!", and continued on. She held Naruto's suit over her head, turning it in the light. She shook it once briskly, forcing motes of ash into the air. While everyone was coughing, Naruto caught the fall of a small slip of paper.

Kakashi's hand darted out for it, but Makoto was apparently quicker than both of them, as she caught it with one hand before it even hit the ground. "Hm," she wondered, her tone mystified as she read," "1 Icha Icha Vol. 2, 19.95"." She turned the slip of paper around. "Oh, there are funny little doodles on this side. How strange. Doesn't that one look like a little rabbit, Naruto?"

The silver-haired jonin was completely non-chalant as Makoto handed the slip to Naruto, his hands occupying themselves with turning his tea cup. Suspision burst into the blond's mind like a sledgehammer through a brick wall, and Naruto glanced at the reciept, ignoring the time and date printed on the front for the "doodles" on the back.

Naruto knew little to nothing about seals, aside from the fact that he had one, he used hand seals on a daily basis, and they lived in snowy regions and did tricks in the circus. The ink and paper seals were almost a complete mystery to him, though he heard that some of the Hokage had been very good at them. (He wondered if _he_ counted as an "ink and paper" seal, given that there was no paper involved). It didn't, however, take a genius to recognize that this was an explosive note. Naruto used enough of them on a regular basis to get the gist of what they did and what they were supposed to look like, and the fact that it was found in his chared, burnt, and _smoking_ suit was the final straw. With surprisingly steady hands, Naruto turned the receipt, noticing the small tear through one brush stroke that apparently made the strip a dud.

"Did I see you reading a new volume of Icha Icha today, Kakashi-sensei?"

Kakashi, of course, was a trained ninja. He was a jonin, and was good enough at it that he was featured in Bingo books, his name known to enemy ninja through out the world. He was a master of observation, and knew the cues that belaid emotion, not to mention all the ways to avoid them. It went without saying that he showed no emotion.

Sakura, however, was a completely different matter.

If Naruto ever wanted to play poker with his team, he now knew who to watch to win big. Sasuke had the habit of turning away every time _something_ happened, so he was at least predictable. Reading Kakashi was an exercise in futility, much like trying to get a Nara to run a marathon or a Uchiha to smile in a school photo. Sakura, however, _could not bluff_. It was as if there was a devil on her shoulder that was telling her the exact _wrong_ ways to hide something and then laughing at Sakura's embarrassment as she was quickly, inevitably discovered.

For one, her hands had clenched so tightly around her tea cup that it exploded, showering her in a brief geyser of warm liquid. Haruka rushed off to get a dish towel while Sakura unfurled her fist with a small, weak smile to reveal that she had no wounds. Her eyes kept darting around the room, first to the broken, burnt corpse of Naruto's favorite suit, then to Naruto himself, and then finally to Kakashi, in a never ending cycle. Her breathing quickened, and with nothing else to do, she smiled weakly at Makoto. "The weather's been lovely lately."

Kakashi coughed. "Sakura, I believe that this calls for a few surprise, midnight training sessions in deception." Sakura lowered her head in shame as Kakashi set his mug back on the table. "Yep. I threw roughly a half dozen explosive notes, about a dozen shuriken, and a smattering of kunai at your jumpsuit." He raised one hand in the air. "Nothing against you, Naruto, but your outfit today was so much more useful in your occupation, and as you finally had a replacement for your jumpsuit, I decided to take care of it."

Naruto didn't twitch, but there was the slightest bit of hesitation in Kakashi's voice as he continued.

"It was a liability on missions. You were visible during the day, in forests, at night, in the water, at the bottom of mine shafts, and even when in henge as someone else. Naruto, I've seen that outfit _glow in the dark_. As your teacher, it's my duty to help you as much as I can. I've done your career as a ninja a huge favor. Why, if I were you, I'd-"

The kyuubi-vessel sliced off the end of Kakashi's sentence with a muted whisper that could only spit out every syllable. "If you say that I should thank you for this, I will cause you greater suffering than you have ever known." There was something dark, something near feral in Naruto's seemingly angular eyes for the briefest of moments.

Kakashi glanced back with one hollow eye. "I doubt that." After a pause, Naruto nodded.

"You're probably right." He glanced up, actual awe morphing his features. He glanced at each member of his team, and he felt a supreme sense of enlightenment fall over him as he realized he had a plan."You owe me."

Kakashi seemed to wince, but the nod of his head showed that he acquiesed. Sakura sighed and bowed her head low enough that it looked like she was going to smack the table, and Sasuke snorted, which made Naruto pause. "Sasuke, what exactly did you have to do with this?"

"Hn. I was the distraction." Sasuke spat the last word, shooting a killing glare at Kakashi, who shrugged it off.

The timeline presented itself to Naruto. "You mean, today in the park...the contest was _bait_?"

The Uchiha briskly nodded. "Aside from the fact that I hate doing it, I believed the paperwork would occupy you for more than the time needed to destroy that ..."uniform" of yours."

"So," Naruto summed up, "you all owe me."

There were reluctant sighs from the collected shinobi, and all three bowed their heads. Sakura's hit the table with a thump, and Naruto picked up something that sounded like "Ino will never let me live a date with him down.", almost muffled by the thick wood.

"Time to pay up."

Even Sasuke looked nervous, while Kakashi managed to feign disinterest. "Oh? Will we be forced to dance naked through the town square? I've done that a few times. It's actually quite liberating." If possible, Sasuke looked even paler. "Will you paint us orange and make us prance through town, then, or just make us dress in drag and-"

"Don't", Sakura ground out, sounding for all the gnashing of her teeth that she was trying to eat through the table, "give him any more ideas."

Naruto watched, and it felt like only a small sliver of himself was actually there. The rest of him was watching the plan unfold, ideas and possibilities pulling away like lotus petals. The plan would require nothing that he didn't have already, and the possiblity of the plan actually coming to fruition seemed to be worth more than the small concession of knowledge he'd have to give. He smiled.

Makoto looked shocked, and Haruka looked worried, while all three of his fellow shinobi tried with varying degrees of success to disguise their fear.

"Knowledge." Naruto shrugged, turning his head to the side almost as if he were carefree. He forced his voice light, and wondered if he'd ever manage to forget the smell of burning leather. "That's all I ask. A simple thing, really."

Of the ninja, only Kakashi's eyes widened, and Naruto decided that only Kakashi had listened to Sarutobi's "Knowledge is Power" speech, or something similiar to it. Naruto was willing to bet that Kakashi _would_ rather walk down the streets of Konoha naked (except, most likely, for his mask, which nothing but _death_ could pry off his face) than spill the many secrets he had in his lifetime.

"Sakura," he smiled, and the kunoichi looked downright worried. "You're really smart, and can probably do this much better than I ever could. I want you to look for all information you can get on a girl named Suzuko Rin. She was a kunoichi about, eh, fifteen or twenty years ago. I know she at least hit Chuunin, and was from a non-bloodline clan, starting out through the civilian primary school system." She glanced up, clearly confused at the fact that Naruto's question had absolutely nothing to do with her bra size or her street address.

Kakashi was as silent as the dead.

"Bastard," Naruto said almost _warmly_, and the dark-haired boy scowled even more than usual in reply. "There's information I need from you. See, there was this boy named Obito - he was an Uchiha. He was Rin's team mate, and he made Chuunin too. Actually, I'm pretty sure he's adopted, because he was actually _smiling_ in the photo I saw of him."

Sasuke snarled. "I already know something about him. He's _dead_."

Naruto shrugged. "Well, duh. I kinda figured that. But, I'm looking for info about his team mates, his teacher, and anything he might've achieved while he was alive."

Sasuke turned his head, but Naruto translated the small snort the Uchiha breathed as meaning "Fine, but this is beneath me."

Kakashi was still, frozen in mid-motion as one hand was clasped around a tea mug, the other mid-fumble with a snap on his vest. The man's silver eyebrow was twitching, just as his eye was focused on something through eight feet of brick wall, three houses away,

"Kakashi-sensei," Naruto started, and almost felt a sense of apprehension as the jonin didn't move. It didn't even look like he was breathing, and for a moment, Naruto thought he _had_ gone into a coma, but continued on doggedly anyway. "As a jonin, you have way more security clearance than I do. I mean, in a couple of years, I'll totally out rank you, but for now, I need you to look someone up for me."

Makoto let out a small gasp of surprise, and Haruka nodded knowingly. He met their eyes, and Makoto smiled.

"His name is Kazama Arashi." Sakura and Sasuke glanced at each other, the silent communication of "Who?" hanging in the air. "He was the jonin sensei of Rin and Obito, had some minor testing through the civilian school system, and," Naruto smirked, suddenly savoring every second of silence that stretched before him in a way that he'd never dreamed of before, "he was the Yondaime."

The sudden shift of Naruto's posture caught all eyes because he leaned forward with a small, friendly smile on his face. One hand carelessly supported his chin while the other adjusted his hitai-ite. He felt the weight of his father's ring for the first time, and he saw Kakashi's pupils contract in the strangest way as the silver of the band caught the overhead light.

The blonde finally concluded as the moment reached it's breaking point, "He was the son of a man named Toppu. The son of a woman named Makoto. The brother of a girl named Haruka."

Makoto arched an eyebrow at the way Sasuke and Sakura's eyes met, mouths working in silent tandem as they slowly pieced together the facts.

"Kazama Arashi was my father. The _Yondaime__ Hokage _was my father."

Hatake Kakashi went very, very still.

* * *

So, many people asked me about the awkward ending to the previous chapter. I can admit now that it was training for the ending of this one. How'd I fare? 

I have news! I'm looking for a beta-reader! I need someone experienced, as I'm obviously not, someone patient with grammar errors, as I only have WordPad on both computers I use which means no Spellcheck, and someone who can help me revise my absurdly long paragraphs. I'm also looking to rewrite or revamp Chapter One, as it seems to be turning away an awful lot of people.

Anyway! This chapter is longer than my first four, possibly my first _five_ comined. I've had this ending swishing around in my brain for weeks, and it's completely different actually having it out in the real world. Tell me if you liked it, because I know that I really, really enjoyed writing most of it for once.

But, comments are more than welcome! Criticism is needed and appreciated. I still love it when you guys quote your favorite lines, especially as it shows me what tones and tenses work better than others.

So, enjoy this incredibly insanely long update. This fic is now the longest thing I have _ever_ written, beating out both my NaNoWriMo fics by a long shot. I can't decide whether I'm proud or saddened that my Psychic-Vampires-from-Atlantis battling Space-Pirate-Robot-Police plot isn't the longest story anymore.

Actually, it probably is for the best.

But, yeah! Hope you enjoyed reading this!


	11. Familial Perpetuality

Chapter 11

Naruto had always believed that if there was a gigantic announcement like, for example, admitting that he was the container of the Kyuubi, Sasuke admitting that he was naturally blond and dyed his hair, or the casual mention of the fact that his father was the Yondaime, it would bring about complete and absolute silence. As it was, there was a wet, clicking sound coming from the back of Kakashi's throat over and over, as if he was trying to get a single syllable out before his brain completely shut down but his body refused to give up so easily. Sakura looked like she'd swallowed an entire invisible watermelon, and Sasuke was, for the moment, unreadable.

Haruka and Makoto glanced at each other, and then Naruto reached for and clasped his grandmother's hand for a fortifying moment before going over to his teacher. He waved his hand in front of the man once, then twice. The jonin didn't respond, his one visible pupil contracted so far that it was completely surrounded by white. Naruto looked back at his team mates with a nervous laugh.

"Yep. He's broken. Dibs on being the new leader!"

Sasuke twitched. More appropriately, one side of his face twitched while the other fought and failed to stay stoic. The side of his mouth quirked up while one eye tried to stay shut. The dark haired boy abruptly turned his head, actually inhaling deeply enough that Naruto could hear it. The blond had no idea twelve year olds could have strokes. "The Yondaime?"

Kakashi twitched in his seat, (though, "spasmed" would've worked just as well) and Sakura seemed torn between screaming and crying. Naruto braced himself for a mixture of both.

He had to calm himself, and with a show of indifference that defied every throbbing "danger" nerve in his body and proved that he was single greatest actor in all of Konoha, shrugged. "Yeah, it was kind of a surprise for me, too, but-"

"_Kind of_?" Sakura bellowed. Immediately, there was a cacophony of thumps, shouts, and bangs from the floors immediately below and beside the apartment, ranging in threats from "I'll call the landlord!" to "They'll never find your body". Sakura glanced around, and Naruto saw her eyes connect immediately with Makoto and Haruka.

Naruto's mouth closed in the middle of a word he didn't realize he was saying, and he forced himself calm. "Look. I know this is a shock to you guys." Sakura's eye twitched, but the Uchiha's face seemed set back into stone. Only the subtle spasms of his finger proved him to be the shinobi equivalent of frothing at the mouth. Naruto pouted. "See, this is why I would've waited, and done it all subtle-like."

Makoto shook her head. Naruto's eyes immediately turned on him, and Sakura and Sasuke followed with him as if they were his puppets. Somehow, he greatly enjoyed that imagery. "Naruto," Makoto sighed, shaking her head softly, "you enjoyed telling them like that, didn't you?"

The blond scratched the back of his head. "Heh. You caught me." Naruto glanced up quickly and found that it was actually Sakura growling, not the entire Inuzuka clan.

"You... Yondaime.. Makoto..." She froze in the middle of her own sentence. "Would you just explain exactly what's going on?!"

Her shouts gained another chorus of threats, this time escalating into "Walls won't stop my wrath!" and "Aren't ninja supposed to be _QUIET?"_.

Naruto glanced at the walls, then the floor, then at Sakura, who had bolted upwards to stand on her chair, chest heaving while one fist was raised in the most sincere promise of pain Naruto had seen in many, many hours. He turned to his grandmother first. "Uh, if we can't keep this down - and I kinda think that's a given at this point - we probably should move somewhere else. There's the fountain place from yesterday - that's not too far away." The blond glanced back at Sasuke and Sakura, his gaze drifting slowly across Haruka, who nodded, and Makoto, who sighed.

"We'll explain everything to the best of our abilities," Makoto started, standing up nervously and bowing slightly. "I only hope that you'll understand that this isn't a joke. My daughter and I are neither involved in nor are intending any deception. Family," she spoke, and Naruto saw the Queen in here again, "is too important to ever lie about."

"Kakashi-sensei," Naruto began, glancing at the prone man, who even now was stuttering (or, well, having a stroke), "I meant what I said earlier about trusting me." He paused, and all the evil, horrible things that Sasuke had ever done flashed before his eyes. The dark haired boys darkened towards him as if he'd been glowing with a bright, neon sign that said "revenge". "You know, when you read that note and thought my grandmother was a hooker?"

"...You _what?_" Makoto reeled on her heel, turning on Sasuke in a split second, while Haruka's head whipped around, first to glance at her mother, than to glance at Sasuke, whose eyes were darting towards the window in much the same manner as a man starving would look at a bowl of ramen. "A hooker! Uchiha Sasuke! Who put notions like that into your head?!"

Three hands rose and pointed automatically. Kakashi seemed to twitch in response, but he'd been doing an awful lot of that lately.

Makoto frowned, and Naruto had the feeling that, had Kakashi been completely there, he would've been long gone by now through the windows, the doors, or even through a hole in the ceiling (as a properly powerful ninja could put a hole through _anything_.) "Hatake-san, you and I will have _words_ after this is done." She frowned again, and when Sasuke realized that she was frowning at him, he seemed to get wide eyed. She placed her hands on her hips. "Do your parents know what Kakashi is teaching you? I do believe that I'll have a word or two with your mother, and together we can-"

The absolute silence in the room made her pause, and Naruto realized that Sakura was watching him. Well, Sakura's head was jerking between Sasuke and Naruto, with the occasional last peek at Makoto. Sasuke himself sat nearly as still has Kakashi had moments before, the pure, unadulterated battle aura seeping out of him even making Naruto's non-shinobi relatives freeze in a nod to the rather useful instinct of not going near the angry shinobi. Outside, dogs barked and cats yowled, and Naruto though he saw the overhead lights flicker. Sasuke's fists curled in his lap.

Naruto shrugged. "I told her about you guys last night and this morning. But, well, "that" wasn't nearly as important as the rest of what I told her."

Sasuke seemed to pause, though there still seemed to be a familiar sort of fury beneath his skin. Naruto decided that he would need to choose his words very carefully so that a huge, angst-filled battle didn't erupt in his apartment. He had a feeling that, if it actually did, he wouldn't just need to buy a new table (as, for shinobi, those were almost _always_ the first things to go, second only to doors), but he'd need to find a new place to live. Mentally, he decided that he needed to review his lease to see just how many ninja battles his insurance covered in a year. "What," Sasuke began, "could be more important than _that_?"

"Geez. Well, I told her about the whole tree-walking thing, and about how you got buried during the bell test. I told her about how nerdy that collar of yours makes you look - do you even _have_ a neck? - and I told her about the way that you pretend to hate ramen." Naruto rolled his shoulders, flexing his fingers in front of him, then placing them behind his head. The fact that he did so had _nothing_ to do with the stash of kunai and shuriken in his hood. "Mainly, I just explained that you're a bastard. It's not like "that" really matters."

There had to be no oxygen in the room, because suddenly Sakura looked like she couldn't breathe, and there was _no_ sound.

"If I could ask...?" Makoto led, her tone respectful. She had already been standing, but she moved to kneel beside Sasuke. "What are you talking about? If I offended you, I apologize for my transgre-"

"My parents are dead. My aunts and uncles. My cousins, some so far and distant from me that I didn't know their names, and only realized their presence when they all died before me."

"O-oh." Makoto reeled back. Naruto carefully positioned himself so that he was standing off to the side between his grandmother and the bastard, who looked neither pissed nor bitter, which proved that Sasuke was either being just as careful with his words as Naruto was, or he was so full of rage that emotions didn't even filter through his thoughts. Makoto glanced back up at Naruto, who hung his head.

"Hell, I didn't tell you because honestly, it's not like it crosses my mind very often. I mean, I knew you, bastard, are an orphan and junk, but the fact of the matter is that, well, that's just _part_ of who you are. So, I just glossed over that and told Grandma about who you really are. A bastard." He paused. "Plus, it gave me a bunch more time to talk about Sakura-chan." He glanced over at the kunoichi, who glanced over Sasuke's side to meet his gaze. She had to feel Sasuke's anger - it left a buzzing in the air like locusts, and somehow _all_ his senses were attuned to it - but she didn't look worried. Instead, her features were morphing into concern, and her eyes were connected to Makoto.

"My family," Makoto whispered, her voice gaining volume and conviction at a glacial rate, "died. All of them. My sisters. My brothers. My small cousins and my nephews. My grandmother, my own parents." Naruto felt something inside of him die, and whatever it was left a hollow crater inside of him that felt _cold_. Makoto's shoulders shook, and he could barely see her tears over the tilt of her head and the way the bangs fell into her face.

"No!" Naruto interjected, and only Sakura's eyes found his. "Don't cry, Makoto! Just don't, okay? If it makes you cry, you shouldn't ever talk about it. I don't want that." Everyone ignored him, and it led Naruto to wonder if he'd actually spoken at all.

Haruka leaned across the table, her whole body reaching until one hand reached far enough over that Makoto clasped onto it reflexively, like a drowning man would a rope. Sasuke and Makoto were locked with each other, and the kyuubi-vessel couldn't exactly say in what. They weren't doing battle - it wouldn't be a "battle" even if they were fighting. It would be called a "massacre" instead - and they weren't even quite watching each other. Makoto's eyes were glued to the hands that laid flat on her knees, while Sasuke, glared through her and past her, into places unknown.

Naruto decided that they were locked in sympathy.

"First, it was plague. It took my grandmother, but she was so old that we didn't know it wasn't of natural causes. My strong little nephews died, one after the other, and before we had time to bury them, their graceful sisters followed. My oldest sister died of a broken heart. My oldest brothers, as soon as word of my grandmother's death came, returned home from their missions and their camps, and ...and... we couldn't warn them in time!" Makoto cried, and Naruto decided that if any neighbor decided to pound on the walls or shout, he would kill them all in their beds.

There wasn't a sound from any of the surrounding apartments, and the dead quiet from the apartment leaked out the windows until even the locusts couldn't be heard.

"I truly am sorry I brought up bad memories, Uchiha Sasuke. But," she paused, and the moment stretched on far past Naruto's life-span, until he was born again and the moment still hadn't ended, "I know. I know what it's like to be... to be..."

Haruka shifted, falling on the table until her feet no longer touched the floor on the other side. Naruto realized in the most distant, cynical part of his mind (he called it "Sasuke") that she looked mildly ridiculous spread out as she was. But, the blond saw the way Makoto nearly crushed her daughter's hand, and the way that Haruka used her other hand not as a balance but as a blanket over Makoto's own, and he knew that he'd never seen a single act more beautiful.

He felt completely and utterly useless as Makoto used her fingers to wipe away tears that Naruto never wanted to see again. She shook her head, her blonde hair flying, and her other hand reached out.

For a moment, Naruto had no clue what was going on. While that in itself wasn't an unfamiliar feeling, the fact that, seconds later, he _did_ realize what was going to happen sent him for a loop.

Makoto's hand touched Sasuke's shoulder.

The second thing Naruto was surprised about was the fact that Sasuke didn't flinch. The _first_ thing that Naruto was surprised about was the fact that no one had died. The only times that Naruto ever touched Sasuke usually involved anger or illness one his part or Sasuke's. In battle, 'someone' (usually named Naruto) was touched by the other, usually with fists, feet, or the occasional full on head-butt. Naruto _had_ willingly held Sasuke at one point, but he figured that one didn't count because he thought Sasuke was _dying_ at the time, and the dark-haired boy seemed as if he didn't remember it anyway. The only other times that Naruto had touched Sasuke involved vomiting, pain, and life long nightmares.

The next thing that amazed Naruto was the fact that he wasn't jealous. There was _need_ in his grandmother's actions, and he wasn't sure what had to be done, or for who, but the fact remained that he would be an intruder if he moved a single inch instead of just an observer. It was curiosity that beat out his jealousy. He was sure that it was inside of him somewhere, beating against the sides of whatever body part he'd squished it into, but the possibility that Makoto could speak a single word about her family triumphed against everything else in his mind.

All in all, Naruto was incredibly surprised that nothing happened when his grandmother's hand rested on the Uchiha's shoulder for a moment, except for the fact that all eyes were latched onto it. Everyone's gaze was wrapped in knots and twisted around as that same hand snaked around the back of Sasuke's neck, and pulled him forward.

Makoto was still kneeling on the floor, and Sasuke had been sitting. Gravity finished what Makoto began, and the dark haired boy flailed into Makoto, one hand catching and rattling the table to keep from completely falling onto the older woman. The other hand hovered in mid air, and Naruto thought for a moment that Sasuke was using it as a balance, but that was only until he saw the way it shook. It kept drifting towards Makoto's hair, then pulling itself away as if magnetically repulsed, looping through those actions as it echoed the very indecision that seemed to rock through Sasuke's entire being.

Naruto wondered just when it was that he knew how Sasuke was feeling. He tried, for a moment, to put himself in Sasuke's, or hell, even his grandmother's place. What would it be like to find someone else who knew what he had been going for all his life? He stopped for a moment, his thoughts slogging through doggedly despite the fact that the tracks headed off road into uncharted territory.

What would it be like if someone had understood him when he was a child? What would have changed if there was another child with a Fox in them?

He tried to picture it in his mind - two children, playing together, laughing, and going home at the end of the day somewhere warm and safe. Somehow, the edges of even his fantasy seemed false. The children - he wasn't sure if he'd even pictured himself as one of them - were blurry, like a badly developed photograph caught mid snap of a shot.

Naruto was snapped out of his reverie by the sound of Makoto's sleeves sliding against the bag of Sasuke's shirt. His ears - the fox's - caught the sound of fingers running through hair, and he was only fairly sure they were only Makoto's.

Haruka had slid back across the table, and Naruto believed she must've been a ninja in a previous life because none of the dishes or silverware had clattered. Well, that he'd noticed. Sakura was frozen, her expression part way between righteous anger (probably that someone else had actually touched "Sasuke-kun"), and complete and utter shock.

Her expression matched nicely with their sensei's, whose lips were still seen moving underneath his mask, though the clicking noise had reduced itself until it was only one audible stutter in five.

Sakura finally made a small noise, and when all eyes turned towards her, coughed and straightened in her seat. Naruto had never in his life wanted to kiss her so badly because it gave Makoto the time she needed to dry the rest of her eyes and stand up, and it allowed Sasuke to quickly untangle himself from Makoto and shuffle back onto his chair.

"So", she continued, "just in case, _does_ anyone here know what to do when someone's having a stroke? Because I'm pretty sure that Kakashi-sensei's at least halfway through one." Her added murmur was likely only meant for herself, but it was loud enough that the fox could hear "Thank god Sasuke didn't hug _her_ back, or else I'd be having one right now, too." That, Naruto decided, sounded like complete and utter jealously.

One visible eyelid twitched in response, his silver eyebrow quirking for a moment.

"Well," Naruto waved with one hand, "if he's halfway through it, it's not like it's going to hurt anything to let him go the rest of the way."

Makoto glanced at Haruka, who caught Sakura's eye, who stared at Sasuke. Sasuke scoffed. "Idiot. It doesn't work like that. He might get brain damage."

There was a pause.

"...so, are there any other symptoms aside from brain damage? He's already so weird that I don't think I could tell."

Makoto placed one finger on her lips. "I believe he's gone into shock. Now, how did you fix that?" She thought for a moment more while Naruto watched, then glided over to Kakashi, pulling back the flowing sleeve of her tunic with one hand. "I'm not sure if I should apologize for this, Hatake-san." She quirked her head, and Naruto saw her _smirk_. "But, I truly believe you need it."

There was the sound of a long, resounding slap.

Sakura sweat dropped. "I think that you're supposed to do that when a person is hysterical, not in shock."

Naruto realized that Makoto hadn't been talking about the _shock_ when she'd said Kakashi had needed it. He desperately, urgently wanted to laugh until he vomited.

The Kyuubi-vessel swore that Sakura was _pouting_ when she'd said that, and understood. "Well, just in case you're wrong, Sakura-chan, why don't you slap him? Then, Haruka can try, and then I guess Sasuke and me could take turns."

Sasuke seemed to raise an eyebrow, but it could've just been a trick of the light as he flipped his bangs. "Just why do you have a death wish? I'm surprised that your grandmother survived." As Naruto blinked, he sighed heavily and continued. "She _did _ just slap a jonin." He paused. "I think Kakashi really is having a stroke."

Naruto shrugged. "Eh, not much we can do about it. Anyway, should I lead you guys to the fountain and explain things there, or do you want to have a couple gos at Kakashi before we leave?"

Sakura rubbed her chin thoughtfully.

"The ring, Naruto." Naruto nearly jumped five feet in the air (only reaching just under four feet and eight inches) when Kakashi's voice spoke up. He slowly creaked his neck around to find the jonin completely unruffled, looking as solemn as the blond had ever seen his teacher. If Kakashi's composure had seemed angry in the afternoon, it now was tinted with something like wonder, as if something he'd overlooked all his life had just slammed into his face. In a way, Naruto realized, it probably had.

The blonde really knew very little about his teacher's past. He knew that his teacher became genin, chuunin, and jonin at horrifyingly early ages. He knew that his teacher was a very good jonin even if he wasn't the best of teachers, as he'd been listed in several bingo books. Even the "teacher" bit came into question just this afternoon when Naruto realized that Kakashi had been testing Sakura - and by proxy, the whole team - in stealth. Naruto wondered just what other lessons they'd completely missed so far.

Aside from all that, Naruto only knew that Kakashi once had a family in Konoha, as the Hatake's were on a section of the Yondaime's map. The blond didn't, however, know what happened to either the compound or the other Hatakes who once had to fill it. He knew that his teacher was a pervert, and until recently, the idea that he was chronically late was set in just as much stone. Naruto knew nothing about Kakashi, but in general, if a shinobi didn't talk about their pasts, you were better off not knowing about it in the first place.

Naruto couldn't help but wonder, however, just why Kakashi had looked so shocked when he'd arrived in his new clothing today, or why the sight of the Yondaime's ring sent him into a fit. Even more puzzling was the fact that his behavior - well, his "heart attack" - had started with just _names_. Rin and Obito.

After puzzling it out for a few moments (which could've actually lasted for minutes), Naruto decided that if his Pop was even half as charismatic as his grandmother was, he probably led a huge number of teams on an obscene number of missions before he became Hokage. It would stand to reason that Kakashi would be paired on the same team as his father once in a blue moon, and Naruto knew that if he met someone like his father, his grandmother, or even his grandfather, he probably wouldn't be allowed to forget it, even if the memory did fade over time.

When Naruto didn't move, the jonin gingerly took Naruto's arm, almost as if he thought it would tear off or rip apart, turning the hand until the signet of the ring dominated all light in the room. Kakashi traced the spiral designs with his eye, and then with his finger, and then with the flesh of his thumb.

Naruto realized exactly _why_ Kakashi had looked amazed when he'd seen the ring's glint. He remembered the Sandaime's words as a child, warning him that his fingers would be burned off if he touched his ring. Naruto wondered exactly how much he didn't know about seals, jutsu, or even basic ninjutsu, because while he never heard of an object being tied through blood, it seemed to be the only thing that made sense.

"I always thought," Kakashi murmured, and if he hadn't pulled Naruto close to where he was sitting, the blond would've had to use the fox to hear it, "that it was you."

Kakashi abruptly let go of Naruto's hand, and the kyuubi-vessel pulled it back slowly, rubbing his hand at the knuckles and holding it close to his chest. Kakashi-sensei was glancing at him, and there was something in the older man's eye - something that almost seemed hungry, as if he were being devoured inch by inch and wouldn't realize it until the tips of his toes were taken.

The silver-haired man gazed at the thumb where he'd pressed so hard against the signet that the marks remained. "Naruto, for a moment, give that ring to Makoto." The jonin's head jerked up, and the expression on his face was so carefully neutral - devoid of hope, condemnation, and of and any true expression except for the natural form of the teacher (Naruto dubbed it the "Do this now, or _else_" expression after having seen it on Iruka's face hundreds and hundreds of times).

Naruto _knew_ that Makoto was his grandmother. She was Arashi's mother. If he was correct about the whole "Bloodline no Jutsu" thing being placed on the Hokage's ring, there was really nothing for anyone to worry about.

It didn't stop the brief flash of fear that he got when he imagined Makoto failing for whatever reason. Perhaps the jutsu only worked for descendants,or perhaps it was somehow linked to chakra and if it was put onto a civilian, they'd explode from the overload.

Naruto raised an eyebrow and caught Makoto's gaze. Silently, he tugged off the ring (it seemed to get caught at the knuckle, and he felt that he pulled the top part of his finger off along with the ring), carefully holding it with two fingers.

The instant that Makoto's index finger brushed the silver band, Kakashi's eyes were riveted on her, though it would take a ninja to truly spot the same rapt, devouring gaze that Naruto had felt.

Suddenly, Naruto found it extremely, horribly creepy that _any_ guy was looking at his grandmother that way - as if he wanted to eat her - let alone his teacher. For a moment, the kyuubi-vessel realized that the only thing worse than Kakashi hitting on Haruka would be Kakashi hitting on _Makoto_.

Makoto turned her finger in the light. "It's a bit bulky for me," she began, and slid the ring off her finger easily. "I don't think I could ever get used to that much weight on my hands." She pulled out Naruto's hand and gently slid the ring on his Index finger.

Kakashi was standing, and the ease with which he did so was so apparent that Naruto wondered if he'd ever really sat down at all. Perhaps he'd just been using a jutsu to _appear_ like he was sitting down, in case of the strange ninja invasion or the like. Kakashi seemed to glance one last time between Makoto and Haruka, and then from Naruto to a strange point in the wall that the boy realized blocked the face of the Yondaime.

"Well, I'm convinced." He didn't need to open up his vest because, quite suddenly, Icha Icha Paradise was _there_. Naruto quickly realized that it was less likely that Kakashi ever put it away than it was that Kakashi merely used a jutsu to pretend that he had. "Sasuke, Sakura," he started, nodding at each of them, "Treat Naruto's grandmother nicely. Naruto," he stated, and his voice took on a stern, lecturing tone, "You'll have to work twice as hard if anyone ever finds out that you're the Yondaime's child."

Kakashi _seemed_ to lick his finger to turn the next page, but as his mouth was still covered it was hard to tell if he'd actually done so, or more puzzlingly, _how_. "That," he began after stretching out his dramatic pause, "is exactly why you shouldn't tell anyone."

Sakura burst out. "What? He's _seriously_ the Yondaime's son? But, the Yondaime was brave and noble! He was a hero of the War of the Rock! Everyone in Konoha remembers how reserved and thoughtful he was! How could _Naruto_ be his son?"

Kakashi scratched his chin. "Aah. Well, my sensei _was _ brave. To a fault, actually. I'm not sure who you actually heard it from, but reserved? Heh. He might've tried to act like it, but for a shinobi, he really couldn't keep a lie with a straight face."

There was a great and horrible pause.

"Kakashi, you enjoyed telling them like that, didn't you?"

The silver haired man's only response was to smirk, his eye turning up. "Well, it's a night full of revelations. I just decided that, well, because Naruto's already announced his parentage, Makoto and Sasuke shared a warm, fuzzy moment together," (Naruto paused and tried to associate Sasuke with "warm" and "fuzzy". He failed.) "we could all reveal a little something about ourselves. Sakura, would you care to tell everyone about your secret, burning passion for Sasuke?"

The pink haired kunoichi immediately went red from the skin showing through her sandals to the very top of her forehead. Her hands immediately went to her cheeks.

Naruto stretched his arms behind his head again. "Sensei, that's not a secret! I mean, it's a mistake, because honestly, who could love a brooding, cold, angsty bastard like that?"

Sasuke glared. Naruto would've died if he were even slightly less of a shinobi.

"Well," Makoto interupted, instantly drawing Naruto's attention and stopping whatever witty retort Sasuke was planning. "I'm glad that this was all settled without bloodshed." She paused. "I can honestly say that it's much better than I thought of a village of ninja."

Sakura seemed to blink. "You mean, there are people who think we solve all our arguments in battles and violence? Makoto, it would take someone incredibly brutish to resort to physical vio- Why are you all staring at me like that?"

"No reason." Sasuke, Naruto, and Kakashi turned around, the dark haired boy looking at a small corner of the ceiling which light did not reach, the blond staring a small patch of corner where three lamps intersected, and their teacher not pretending to do anything glancing at Sakura with an incredulous raise of an eyebrow.

"Oh, you guys are all jerks." She stopped. "Except for you, Sasuke-kun."

Haruka turned to the kunoichi, and Naruto could tell that she was calmer than before because she actually was using her hands to speak for herself again. "It's not that we've actually heard many stories about Shinobi, Sakura-san. Honestly, we don't hear many stories about shinobi at all."

"Which is probably why hidden villages have survived as long as they have." All eyes darted towards Kakashi, except for Sasuke's, whose ears perked in response. "We live in an age of wireless radio and electricity. In their own ways, both of these could become weapons against us in exactly the same way as a jutsu. By carefully regulating the knowledge of our missions and our village, we prevent our technology from becoming commonplace." The silver haired man's finger was actually wagging, and Naruto realized with nothing short of awe that Kakashi was actually _teaching_ them.

"Generators in this village are powered with timely bursts of lightning-jutsu, while demolitions include Doton and large amounts of explosive notes, which are made by ninja. We don't sell our services or our products to outside villages without strict supervision because these are just as important to keep hidden as our own village. Now, I wouldn't say that we specifically strive to keep the outside world uneducated. We welcome outsiders to come to our village to learn. However, if, for example, a pair of refugees from a far off nation were to come into Kohona to be educated about us and our technologies, they would be initiated as a part of Kohona."

Makoto sucked her bottom lip, and she nodded. "We won't be able to leave, will we?"

Haruka turned to her mother. "Why would we? Our home, our village, both are gone. The caravan has broken up, Kichiro is..." for a moment, she trailed off, and then her head lifted, "there is no one for us, Mother, who is not here already."

A warmth spread through Naruto, and he felt a silly sort of grin slid onto his face. He was aware of Sakura staring at him, but he ignored it in favor of Makoto and Haruka.

A moment passed. Then another.

"Wait a second!" Naruto shouted. "Sensei, your sensei was my old man? Why the _hell_ didn't you tell me this earlier?"

There weren't thumps on the walls. However, there was the sound of multiple shuriken impacting the windows (specifically reinforced for that reason), a small explosive note, and the sound of one of the tripwires outside Naruto's window being triggered.

"Er. Yeah. Park would be a great idea right now." He glanced to his grandmother. "Do either of you want a ride?"

Haruka grinned.

* * *

"...So, my Arashi, darling that he was, picked up her entire birthday cake and threw it on her face.." She shook her head with a sigh. "Of course, Toppu just _had_ to be standing right behind her, and he got absolutely covered in it. Of course, so did the walls, the floor, and parts of the ceiling." She stopped. "I honestly don't know how he managed that." 

Haruka snickered, turning her body so that she faced her mother. "I remember that! I stopped crying immediately because honestly, you can't really cry when you have a mouth full of sugar, and he looked just as ridiculous with that nose on."

"But, that was nothing compared to the way Toppu looked covered in pink icing, with your cute little unicorn on his cheek." Makoto covered her mouth with her hand, her grin peaking out the sides despite her best efforts. "God, every time I looked at him for the next week, I couldn't help but laugh. I still can't decide if I want to praise Arashi or smack him for giving you those permenant markers and not telling me about it."

Haruka turned to Sasuke, who was sitting between her and Makoto, looking for all the world like he was surrounded by eighteen-foot tall one-eyed ogres who feasted on the flesh of dark-haired brooders. "This was one of the rare occassions that my father and my brother were both home. I can't decide whether it happened so rarely because of their schedules, their relationship, or the fact that the universe itself knew for a fact that whenever the two of them met, it would only end in complete and utter chaos."

Naruto interupted, holding up two fingers while the other hand quickly moved across the page of his notebook. He scribbled one last line, circled it, and then glanced at Haruka again. "I thought you said that Toppu didn't think my Pop was a good ninja. Something about being so clumsy he'd fall on his own sword."

Kakashi snickered, and when all eyes turned to him, the silver-haired man quickly bent over his book again, leaning against his tree as if he were completely absorbed in the world of perversion. Privately, Naruto decided that he'd long ago been lost to the strange, dark, and twisted world of perverts and lechers, and he just made periodic trips up to get new books and to torture poor, innocent children.

"Anyway," Naruto continued, keeping one eye on his sensei, "If my Pop and Toppu met up, how could he miss the fact that Arashi was an awesome ninja and stuff?"

Makoto turned her head into one hand. "Well, it's rather complicated. Toppu claimed that Arashi would fall on his sword because honestly, I simply think he wanted it to be true. He always read all of Arashi's letters, and though he never sent any of his own, I know that he only wanted to believe that Arashi was safe." She stopped and shook her head. "I'm explaining this badly. Toppu and Arashi were so alike that they couldn't stand to be together for a long period of time. But, that only started after they began being apart. After Arashi turned five, Toppu started taking his longer missions, and Arashi and I were left alone longer and longer. There has to be something strange in Arashi turning into someone he wasn't around, but it was almost as if Toppu was there the whole time, teaching Arashi exactly how they could annoy each other."

"I think that the greatest regret in Toppu's life was the fact that he let Arashi become a ninja." Makoto sighed, slowly releasing her fist. She smoothed out her shirt with one hand, anxiously. "I was neutral about it. The ninja who recruited Arashi was so persuasive about how good it would be for Arashi - the chance to make friends his own age, the chance to truly develop his mind and his skills, and the fact that, with proper instruction, all of his gifts would help those around him - that I couldn't say no to him."

She shook her head. "Toppu turned the recruiter away three times before Arashi finally kicked him in the shin and threatened to leave in the middle of the night. Toppu was still stubborn, and we finally found Arashi in the next village three days later. After that, Toppu personally escorted him to Konohagakure." She a half smile on her face that slowly fell away.

"I can't help but wonder," she began, the pace of her words slow and careful, "if it was a mistake."

Sakura shook her head. "But, the Yondaime was so important to Konoha! He helped build hospitals and orphanages! He was responsible for the Widow's Act and the stipulations in the Fund Distribution contract." She twisted her head around, clearly feeling Naruto's intense gaze. "Oh, I did some research on him before I entered the academy." She blushed, and Naruto couldn't help but wonder why. "I had a kind of..." she trailed off, and her eyes caught Naruto's for a split second before she turned her head away so quickly Naruto thought it would fly off into the fountain, "Well, it doesn't matter what I fel- I mean, "thought" about the Yondaime." She coughed.

"Anyway, without the Yondaime, Konoha would be a worse place." She stopped. "You really can't say that about just anyone, you know. Widows, orphans, and injured ninja would be even worse off than they were before." Sakura tried to smile, and Naruto thought that she meant it to be encouraging. "He saved so many lives that the idea of him being anything but a ninja is ...impossible."

Haruka and Makoto glanced at each other for a moment, their unspoken communication bypassing Naruto completely. Haruka nodded her head, and Makoto sighed, glancing first towards Naruto, and then to Sakura, and behind her, Kakashi. "You say that he was a good ninja, and that because of him the world is a better place. Toppu _loved_ Arashi, and I can't truly put into words how deeply he felt it, just as he couldn't even dream of doing so. Toppu might've known even before I did that Arashi, simply by being alive, made the world easier to be in. But, Toppu believed, like you, Arashi would save lives, that he would change them until they were happy and healthy again. He just wanted his son to be a doctor, a writer, a scientist, or a teacher. Not once did I hear my husband say he wanted his son to follow in his footsteps. Toppu never wanted his son to be a warrior. He wanted his son to be _alive_ to see the better world he created with his own hands."

Makoto breathed in sharply, and Naruto remembered to do the same.

"Kakashi-san," Makoto began, her voice suddenly proud, the crane of her neck regal and commanding, "How did my son die?"

Somehow, Naruto resisted whiplash. He didn't twist his neck to watch Kakashi. He didn't lick his lips. Honestly, he didn't move, and later he would've mistaken himself for dead if it weren't for his even, steady breathing. He considered that a grand improvement from all the _other_ times he'd been shocked and horrified lately.

Naruto noticed Sakura and Sasuke look at each other (though, that involved a badly disguised "Help me" plea from where Sasuke sat sandwiched between the two women) before glancing at Kakashi, who had drawn down his book. The silver-haired man caught Naruto's eyes, and the blond wished for all the world that he knew what Kakashi's gaze was trying to say.

"Naruto said yesterday that the Yondaime - that is, Arashi-kun - died defending this village. But, what I don't understand is what could've caused the leader of a village to sacrifice his life. Aside from that, this isn't just a village, but a village of _ninja_. What would possibly cause..."

She trailed off because Kakashi stepped away from the tree, towards the fountain where they were all gathered.

"They called it the Kyuubi no Kitsune. The Legendary Nine Tailed Fox." His footsteps were silent, but Naruto heard them thud in his ears. "No one quite knows where it came from, and no one knows why it targeted Konoha. But, it came to us as if it were driven by ...I can't say fury, because everyone who was there knows that fury is a human emotion, and _it_ wasn't human."

"You were there, sensei?" Sakura asked, leaning forward eagerly in a way that made Naruto's stomach churn.

Kakashi nodded. "I acted as a messenger between our scattered offensive lines. No one knew what to do, so everyone seemed to want to lead. The Fourth was..." He shook his head. "No. You need to hear the whole story."

Naruto was suddenly glad that he was sitting on a short, petrified tree stump across from his family because he knew that if he were even a foot closer to them, they'd hear his heartbeat, they'd feel the heat radiating off him as if he were on fire. He decided quickly he _would_ prefer being on fire to being there, listen to Kakashi's even, level tone.

He knew the silver haired man was talking about the thing inside of him. The monster who was part of him. Every word had the potential to explode because suddenly, it seemed that there were a thousand tripwires twisted between him and Makoto, and between his team mates and him.

Every careless action, every battle where he'd used too much chakra to still walk afterwards and still gotten up (which, of course, referred to all of his battles), every glance that any villager ever gave him in their presence - Hell, even the fact that he'd told _both_ groups about the assassins and the near-universal hatred towards him - probably already sparked something in their minds.

His eyes gravitated towards Sakura first. He realized that she'd been watching him all along. Even before this conversation, even before the dinner with Makoto. Something - his outfit, his hair, his actions - made her figure _something_ out, and even if she hadn't yet, Naruto knew from experience that a girl that smart wouldn't stop until she knew it all.

"Three days. It took three days to make Konoha crumble. No defense we could assemble could stop it, and no offense we could pose would do anything but make it angry. The Kyuubi wasn't a villain. A creature of that power, of that much evil, could only be called a natural disaster. A force of god."

Kakashi ran one hand through his hair, and Naruto wanted Kakashi to feel just as flustered as he did, so that perhaps the man would choose his words carefully, or stop in the middle of a sentence and never, ever start up again.

"Our civilians were stowed safely in our bunkers and our tunnels, but that didn't change the fact that with a careful step, the Kyuubi could make the mountain crumble around them and kill them all. Our strategy was to try to lure the Kyuubi away from Konoha, because even if we saved all the children and civilians, it wouldn't help if there wasn't a Konoha for them to return to."

Sasuke and Sakura were rapt in attention. Sakura was practically licking her lips at the new information, and she obviously had a thousand questions dancing on her tongue. Sasuke's "rapt attention" meant that he wasn't feigning disinterest, and his eyes actually connected with his teacher's.

Naruto hated his eyes so very, very much because they turned on their own to Makoto and Haruka. He was almost relieved to see the confusion on Haruka's face, because confusion meant that she wasn't angry at him. Her confusion was sweet and he practically cried when he saw the same on Makoto's face.

She turned to him, and he couldn't look away in time, because looking away might mean he'd miss every last moment she wasn't hating him.

"If it weren't for the Fourth, there would be no Konoha today. I can't say that I know precisely what he did, as he used one of the many powers in his possession to draw the Kyuubi deep into the thick, old woods outside the village, away from everyone who would have followed him. Which," Kakashi stopped with a wry laugh, "Was all of us. He went alone into the woods, and did not return."

Naruto could see the shadows stretching before him - darker than the night sky and darker than the small patch of forest around them all. Brushing his back were old trees - trees so old that the forest had sprung out around them, trees so old and gnarled that they had faces twisted in the bark. These were trees with histories.

There were trees in Konoha where, after fifty years worth of children had climbed its limbs and swung from rope swings on it's branches, it gained a friendly, welcoming personality. The tall trees outside of Konoha's gates had become foreboding over the years, and the gnarled tree covered in ribbons and bells maintained a strange atmosphere that made Naruto always step quietly and smooth down his hair. These were all trees with souls.

He was surrounded by them now and the history that they had seen seemed like it was written on their bark. He could smell the acrid smoke of gunpowder mixing with the ashes of the dead as they burned, and the familiar smell of wood smoke that seemed to cement the fact that Konoha was _burning._ Hanging in the air like a fog was unspent chakra. He'd never felt anything like it before, but it was as if the shinobi were cut down in the middle of a jutsu, and the jutsu never left.

It was a memory, and it wasn't his.

He tried desperately to stay _himself_ the only way he knew how, his hands clenching on his legs so hard that he knew they'd leave bruises for at least an hour from the effort. His teeth clenched so hard that he thought they'd all shatter, and he decided that he'd prefer that pain - pain that he knew was from _his_ body, from his own teeth and his own stupidity, to the small, aching pinpricks he felt in legs that weren't his own. He tried to summon all his chakra, but he realized that it was tied in with the Kyuubi's when it was too late to undo.

Kakashi continued, but the scene he set was completely different from how it played in Naruto's mind.

Konoha was tiny. It was almost insignificant except for how it stood out from the forest and cleaved nature in two. There was a mountain nearby, and though he could tell every individual stone in it, what faces were on it were insignificant because they were human. A thousand screams and cries mingled in his ears so quickly and so faintly that it was like a high pitched ringing that made his tails flail.

Around his legs, something that Naruto could only call ants swarmed, and their stings ached. Naruto realized at that moment that Kakashi was _wrong_. He was completely right, but he was entirely off the mark when it came to the essence of it.

The Kyuubi wasn't human. That was correct. However, it _felt, _and you didn't need to be human for that It was millennia old, older than even the oldest trees in Konoha. If trees could gain souls - could gain memories and histories and personalities - then the Kyuubi had advanced above them, gaining something that humans couldn't begin to comprehend.

It felt like everything.

It was impossible to describe, but even in his memory (Naruto desperately latched onto the fact that it was "their" memory, because even if it meant that he and the Kyuubi were sharing it, it meant that at least HE was there with the Kyuubi, which was something he couldn't help but forget when presented with the Kyuubi's view of it.) Naruto knew that there _was_ fury in the Kyuubi's actions. But, it didn't care about Konoha. It didn't care about the pinpricks and the flashes of light that heated his fur. It didn't care about the giant toad that refused to bow to him (Naruto briefly wondered where the _hell_ that came from, and if foxes could actually hallucinate).

It was revenge. It was fury. It was anger. It was a need, and a weight, and a pressure all at once that left heavy on the Kyuubi's shoulders, and it felt like it was crushing Naruto whole.

In spite of all of that, in spite of the fact that the Kyuubi's senses were so sharp that it could hear through the solid mountain to the individual stones that clicked and clattered down forgotten, hidden caverns never touched by man, it was a child.

Naruto's head ached through his teeth (which he realized were still clamped down so far that his cheeks ached) to the flesh behind his ears. It _hurt_ trying to understand the Kyuubi as physically as if there was a shuriken inside of his brain that was trying to get out the hard way (which was actually probably the only way a shuriken knew how). The Kyuubi was millennia old, and it had bore witness to everything that led to the rise of ninja. It had seen empires rise and fall. It had sank continents into the sea, and had made mountains rise so high with it's footfalls that even he couldn't scale them.

It was frightening to think of the fact that the Kyuubi, millennia old, last witness to a thousand cities and histories and societies, was nothing more than a child.

There had never been anyone for Naruto to play with on rainy days. On sunny days, he would go into the woods and explore, or go into the playground and watch the children around him, an act which usually ended in trailing one of them to their homes and their families. But it was never more evident that he was alone than on rainy days when the crack above his bed leaked and the sound of rain pelting the window muted everything else, even the sobs he never, ever cried.

It was impossible for Naruto to sit still. He was energy in flesh, he was movement bound by bones, and even chains would rattle out of the ground because he wouldn't stop fidgeting. Naturally, the days when he'd be confined in his apartment were _torture._

Within hours, he'd flick through every book propping up every table and cabinet in the house. His kunai would be polished spotlessly (well, half of them), and his refrigerator would be emptied before the light in it could turn off. This had resulted in disastrous cooking sessions such as "Fried Sugar Water", "Ramen-wrapped Ramen", and "Burnt Jell-o", the last of these being something that he was still moderately proud of.

The heart of the matter was that Naruto had gotten bored of every single one of those things, and after there was nothing new to try, he'd get angry. As a child, he couldn't help but wonder about his life - about why people hated him, about why all the other children had parents, about how all the other people around him never seemed to have to worry about creepy people in masks staring through their windows, or about people following him down alleys in the late hours of the night. There were never any answers, which led to frustration, which led to kicking his closet door, which eventually escalated into the fact that that door had been replaced five times before he turned nine.

The Sandaime had inspected the damage after the last request, personally wandering around the apartment, glancing at the crack in the ceiling, the dented furniture and the occasional crater in the wall. He had forced Naruto to fix all of them himself, and for years, Naruto couldn't help but wonder why.

Except, now that he looked back on it, he was less inclined to head-butt the wall because of the fact that the plaster he used to fix it clung to his clothes and stank horribly. It was hard to find replacement tables, and it was even harder to find dressers that had shinobi-grade locks on them. The Sandaime "persuaded" the landlord to fix the roof above Naruto's apartment, but he'd also shown Naruto how to cover the crack with plaster and paint from inside of the apartment.

Old Man Sarutobi had shown Naruto exactly _why_ (needless) violence caused more problems than it was really worth. But, there was no one to tell the Kyuubi that lesson.

Somehow, Naruto could _feel_ that there were others. Maybe there weren't actually others like him, but there were others like the Kyuubi. It was like being in a large, dark room, bumping into furniture and continually slamming toes and elbows into walls. You never saw anyone else in it, and you never felt anything but cold, but the sound of someone laughing themselves sick at you proved someone else was there.

The Kyuubi was an angry, lonely, energetic being of limitless potential and power, bound into the navel of an equally angry, lonely, energetic human boy with slightly less potential and power.

It was a wonder Naruto hadn't torn himself in two by now trying to be everything at once. At least Naruto had the option of going somewhere, of breaking something, of seeing other people even if he were never, ever allowed to be by them. The Kyuubi no Kitsune was caged, jailed by Naruto's father for something that, for all sides, was really for their own good.

Konoha would've crumbled because even after the ninja led the fox away from the city, a child's curiosity would've wondered "Why?", or perhaps it would have been guided by that foreign, nameless _need_ inside of the Kyuubi inside of Naruto's mind. Either way, a beast as large as the fox couldn't help but stumble into buildings and against the mountain in much the same way that someone in a movie theatre couldn't help but knee the people in the next two rows when they were trying to get out The entire city would've turned to ashes and rubble, and the people who were left would swarm out. The Kyuubi wouldn't have hunted down the individual shinobi after the city was destroyed because, like kicking over an ant hill, one shinobi blended into the next, and all that was left was a black tide washing over the ground.

But, the shinobi here posed no challenge. If the revenge-thirst-hunger inside of the Kyuubi hadn't been satisfied that day (Naruto had to inhale sharply when he realized that it still _wasn't_, and it just sat inside of the Kyuubi - inside of HIM - waiting to twist the two of them in knots), he might've moved on to the next Hidden village.

It made Naruto freeze completely in such a way that his fingertips actually felt cold. He swore he saw his breath puff out in short bursts as the thought pounced on him from behind and rammed his mind into the metaphorical brick wall.

Naruto hadn't ever heard of the Kyuubi attacking a civilian town.

The Land of Fire was among the largest kingdoms on the continent. Konoha was hidden somewhere close to the center (as the exact location wasn't known to even the wisest shinobi or the most important civilians, and both were guided by either experience or heavily armed ninja escorts), and the Kyuubi had to come from _somewhere_.

That in itself hurt Naruto's brain - where _did_ the Kyuubi (and the others who were like him) come from? The fact of that matter was that even if the Kyuubi fell from the sky somehow, it didn't fall directly on Konohagakure. Then again, Naruto pondered, one of his hands twisting itself in the strap of his courier's bag, the shinobi of this village _should_ have been able to spot the Kyuubi if it really was that big. Especially if it caused earthquakes and tsunamis with every swish of it's fluffy tails. (Naruto know he'd pay for the "fluffy" remark. He didn't know how, and he didn't know when, but he knew that somehow, the Kyuubi would make it happen.) Casualties would've have been so bad if the shinobi had spotted the Kyuubi, but that _was_ assuming that it came from across the land.

What truly made Naruto's brain knock against the front of his skull was the fact that, on all the C missions that he'd taken with his team over the last few months, he'd never seen "Kyuubi Canyon", or "The Mountain That Used to Look Like an Old Man Until the Kyuubi", or even "Kyuubi no Kitsune flood-planes". There weren't any gigantic craters in the middle of the forest, and Naruto had explored Konoha in all directions for about three days running.

The fact of the matter was that even if the Kyuubi _did_ fall out of the sky, Konoha ninja were (supposed to be) good enough to spot something that big blocking out the sun. Because Naruto hadn't heard about any forewarning to the attack (though, he'd need to research it), it proved that the Kyuubi came - quickly - from the surrounding areas (assumably on the ground).

The Land of Fire wasn't a small country, nor was Konohagakure a small village. Most people wouldn't have thought of it, but a village as impressively large and functioning as Konoha required food, and this was not food that the Akimichi's plantation alone could provide, as most of that was providing for the family itself. There were, of course, small peasant run farms scattered alone the small roads pocketed through Konoha, governed under the watchful eye of whichever local lord was actually paying attention.

Because of the fact that these small farms gave up most of their goods to the Lords that were supposed to protect and guide them (to their credit, some of them actually did), this meant that Konohagakure received most of it's food from not just other nearby villages, but other countries as well.

Cloth was imported from the Land of the Mist, while metal was plentiful in the mountains of the Land of the Rock. There was still debate over it, but many were convinced that the war with the Rock was less about the assassination of one of Konoha's chuunin teams in enemy territory and more about the accessibility of resources in that same area.

What this all added up to was the fact that the Kyuubi _should_ have passed through and destroyed one of the many, many civilian villages, farms, or towns that surrounded the Hidden Village of the Leaf. Instead, it was Konohagakure itself which received the full force of the Kyuubi's wrath.

And wrath it was.

Naruto realized at that moment that he was the single unluckiest bastard in all of history because there was no way he could blame anyone for his life

He'd already forgiven the villagers for all the crap they'd pulled on him and it seemed like a real Sasuke-esque thing to go back to hating them again. He couldn't hate his father, not just because there seemed to be something elementally wrong with that, but because the Yondaime was doing what was best for his village (and Naruto briefly wondered with a twisting in his belly if his father was thinking of him when he died). The Kyuubi itself might've suffered a fate even _worse_ than being sealed in a newborn if he'd gone on to ransack other Hidden villages, but truthfully, the Kyuubi was like the universe's wisest, snarkiest, most powerful four year old with an anger management problem, and it seemed like even MORE of something Sasuke would do to blame a pre-schooler for all his problems.

Naruto forced his ear back to Kakashi's story, rather happy that the fox let him do so without comment (as the fox talking to him would've been the cherry on the day's "crazy" cake) and he wondered briefly if he'd been listening to anything his teacher had said even with half a mind, and if any part of that "half a mind" could be formed into a bunshin later so he could find out what was said.

He gathered something about how the Yondaime seemed to disappear for a few hours. No one saw a trace of him until shortly after nightfall on the third day of the Kyuubi's rampage. For a moment, Sakura pursed her lips. "If there was this battle for the village," she began, "why wasn't he fighting all the time?"

"Me." All heads jerked to Naruto except for Kakashi, who nodded solemnly. "I was being born." He paused. "At least, that's what I kinda want to think about. He was probably researching the fox or something, but-"

"No, he was there," Makoto said firmly. "When I was in labor with Haruka - 72 hours of it - Toppu found _some way_ to cross through three different Lands to make it back to cut her umbilical cord. Arashi would've climbed through a thousand layers of hell to be there when you were born, Naruto. I'm sure of it."

It might've been small, and it might've been sickly, but a part of Naruto saw the Yondaime and the unknown, faceless, much loved mother he never knew together one last time, and a smile tugged at his lips. "Yeah. That would be nice. To know that I met him once, you know?"

"I guess," Sakura whispered, "there's no arguing how important it was for him to be away for those hours then."

Sasuke seemed to snort, but there was actually a .1 percent chance that it was a _sniffle_. Naruto decided to believe that Sasuke was just being a complete ass rather than human, because one of those options was not like the others, and would involve alien replacement, alternate dimensions, _and_ voodoo hypnotism to be plausible.

"So," Makoto began, "he finally met his fox."

Haruka snorted. "Go figure. After all these years, he meets the only evil one. That seems like him. He always was the world's luckiest fool. But, when his luck _did_ run out, it followed the pattern set by every one of Arashi's actions, and went out spectacularly."

Sakura glanced at Naruto, who shook his head and shrugged. Inside, he was desperately failing at trying to figure out the "only evil one" part of the sentence.

Kakashi glanced towards the two women with a lazy eye. "I believe there's a story there. Explain?" It was only a half-hearted attempt at making it sound like a request, but Makoto nodded, and Naruto decided to halve the pain Kakashi would be in when the blond got through with him.

"Well," she began with a slight blush tinging her cheeks, "You might have noticed already that I enjoy telling stories." Naruto wasn't the only one to nod enthusiastically. "My children and," she blushed further, "most of the children of my village and the others around it have heard my folk-tales. These were stories passed through word of mouth from my mother, from my grandmother, and from her mother before her, up until before anyone can remember. The kitsune," she stated firmly, "was just one of the creatures I have stories of. There's the kappa, which was a favorite of Haruka, the tanuki, who Toppu seemed to like," Haruka snorted, and Naruto resisted a laugh as he heard "More like 'The tanuki, who Toppu resembled...'", "and various others. Truthfully, it was probably only after he requested stories of kitsune for three weeks worth of bedtimes that I realized that all of his pranks were _emulating_ the kitsune."

She received blank stares.

"You've never heard of the stories of foxes?"

Sakura mutely shook her head. "I've never heard of any story about the Kyuubi - well, the kitsune - that anyone would _want_ to emulate." She trailed off. "The _Yondaime?_" she pressed.

Naruto felt pulled in ten directions. Part of him wanted to rush to the Hokage's monument and have a long, angry stare down with his father, part of him wanted to run away from his team and never show his face again because Sakura's face _still_ showed signs of painful, creeping enlightenment, and part of him desperately needed to sit completely still so that Makoto would continue speaking about _why_ his father emulated a _KITSUNE._

Kakashi, Naruto was stunned to note, didn't stop her from continuing on. He did note, however, that the older man's interest wasn't focused at all on the book in front of him.

"Hm. Where to start? First off, if Konoha's kitsune - the Kyuubi - exists, I wonder if that means that there are others, and that all the stories are true." She shook her head. "Well, I'm not sure how much truth there really are to these, then, but I've heard from my grandmother that, like my Arashi and my dear Naruto here, that kitsune love to pull pranks. There are stories of some of these pranks turning out badly, and some pranks performed with ill intent, but I've heard few stories of a fox actually being evil. I believe some villages see them as minor deities, or at the very least, signs of good luck."

Naruto twitched for a moment. His brain poured out his right ear as he tried to imagine the Fox being worshipped as a God. Despite how incredibly tempting the idea of being worshipped as a deity was, there was the fact that the Demon was as much a God as Sasuke was a pretty little pirate. There was no debating the pirate part of it, and it was exactly the same way with the fox.

"I told my Arashi about the pranks they pulled on priests, and how catching their orbs - I believe they were called "Hoshi no Tama". Star balls - was to make them owe you a great debt."

Naruto decided that he would release the seal of the Kyuubi himself and let the fox gut his teacher if Kakashi-sensei let out so much as a snort.

Makoto glanced around. "I don't suppose any of you know what "Kitsune" means, do you?"

Sasuke raised his eyebrow in an act he probably practiced in front of a mirror for an hour every night. "Fox".

Makoto seemed to frown, but instead she sighed and shook her head, wagging one finger in admonishment. "Yes, but there the _word_ "kitsune" has to come from somewhere." She was obviously in complete story teller mode now, and Naruto knew from experience that even if the Sandaime ordered an impromptu beach party for all of Konoha at the fountain they were gathered around, he wouldn't be able to turn away.

"They say that, long ago, there was a man named "Ono". He was neither handsome nor rich, but he had a kind heart and a warm smile. As he increased in age, he soon realized that he was wanting of a wife. "Oh," " Makoto spoke, her voice shifting to one of despair, ""If I had been a rich man, I could have one the heart of a noble lady. If I had been handsome, I could've found someone to spend the rest of my lonely days with. Instead, I am a kind man, and I am alone but for the company of my faithful dog." "

Even Sasuke wasn't trying to hide his interest in the story. Naruto wondered exactly how many bedtime stories _he'd_ heard, even before the whole "Orphan" thing. Sakura was rapt, and Kakashi almost seemed to nod, though Naruto couldn't ever explain why.

"As he was walking along a lonely road," Makoto continued, "he saw a maiden with skin as pale as the moon and hair as dark as the shadows cast by the noonday sun, clad in a beautiful kimono, glancing at him with a warm smile. "I am not a rich woman, and my beauty cannot compare to the warmth of your smile, but I would spend the rest of my lonely nights with you, if you so desire.""

"Many remarked on the odd pairing the two made. Countless suitors tried to woo her away from Ono, but each one could not bear to break apart the two lovers once they witness the two together. Now," Makoto stated, her hands speaking for her just as much as her words did. Naruto could see exactly where Haruka got that trait from. "As Ono's love was with his child, his hound was with pup herself. The woman pleaded with her husband to send the dog away, but the kind hearted man could not bear to send his longtime companion out into the cold in her condition."

"On the day his wife went into labor with their first son, his dog had her pup, who began growling at the wife while still slick from the womb. Each day as the pup grew, the woman became more and more withdrawn until the day finally came where the pup attacked. Startled," she intoned, making Naruto jump, "she changed, her beautiful skin turning into fur the color of the moon, and her beautiful hair bleaching and shifting into split tails. She dashed over the fence, her fox form revealed to her love, but as she ran off, Ono called back to her."

There was a fond smile on Haruka's face. Makoto leaned forward, her eyes closed and her voice becoming soft.

""You may be a fox," Ono called after her, "but you are the mother of my son and I love you. Come back when you please; you will always be welcome."

So every evening she stole back and slept in his arms." (1)

Makoto opened her eyes with a dreamy expression on her face. "Kitsune can be taken as kitsu-ne, which is "come and sleep", but I prefer the other meaning. "Ki-tsune". It means "Always comes"."

If Kakashi _dared_ to laugh, Naruto decided that releasing the fox on him would be far too lenient compared to what he deserved. If Naruto had to wait a thousand years until he came up with a punishment that truly fit Kakashi's crime it would still be completely worth it.

Amazingly, Sakura was the only one to shift her posture, and she did so by leaning forward, one hand propping up her chin. "I wonder why we were never told any of these "good" legends of foxes. I've heard of tanuki and kappa before-"

"I haven't!" Naruto frowned. Makoto glanced over to him with wide eyes.

"Really?" She paused. "I'll fix that. Have you ever had a bedtime story?"

While the blond quickly shook his head, Sasuke snorted, which validated Naruto's previous thought. "A Bedtime story, Uzumaki? How childish."

Makoto pursed her lips and _glared_ at Sasuke in a strong, firm manner that made Naruto decide to devote the rest of his life to never, ever getting that same look set upon him. The Uchiha attempted to glare at her in return, but the slow cross of her arms across her chest forced him to turn away his head in what Naruto decided was complete and utter shame and embarrassment.

Naruto desperately wanted a camera.

"Childish it might be, but everyone deserves to be a child at least once in their lives." Naruto felt Makoto's gaze fall on him, and he tried to devote fifteen parts of his brain to memorizing this moment. Despite the fact that she knew about kitsune (in general, luckily), knew about how his father died, and had just touched the tip of the iceberg on teenage ninja trauma in Konohagakure, all was well. She didn't know the full story behind his life, and so, she didn't hate him.

He didn't actively _plan_ on ever, ever telling either his family or his team about the Kyuubi, but somehow, he knew that the divine spirits above really, really hated him. Recent events proved that fate, destiny, karma, or whatever foul plot he was embroiled in since before birth wouldn't let him have more than a moment's peace. It was a struggle to keep anything in his life secret and, despite his best efforts over the past few days, his only success had been not spilling about his family to the Sandaime and not actually uttering the sentence "I _am_ the vessel for the Kyuubi" at the top of his lungs from the highest part of the Nidaime's pointy nose.

Makoto pouted, and Naruto wondered in a quick panic just exactly how long he'd been "memorizing that moment".

"I can't believe they let twelve year olds become ninja." She shook her head. "I can't believe they start training ninja at eight." She sighed again, and eased herself down onto the fountain again. Naruto heard several of her joints creak, and winced. Her age wasn't something he either needed to remember, or think about in great detail. "Thank goodness for those bed wetting requirements, or else I wouldn't have had Arashi for any time at all."

The fountain bubbled merrily, Haruka snorted, and there was the unified sound of four ninja blinking, which sounded with the same heavy thud as the last of an avalanche cascading down a mountain.

"Bed," Kakashi started, deadpan.

"Wetting?" Sakura asked, her voice having no short amount of horror in it.

"Requirements?" Sasuke intoned. His eyebrow was raised.

Naruto sat in unfeigned, untamable horror. It felt once and for all like all the hope and respect he had within him collapsed into a super-heated, miniscule dot in the center of his stomach. It wasn't gone entirely, but it would take nothing less than a complete and undeniable miracle to ever make it expand again.

"Oh yes," Makoto continued on, proving once and for all that even beautiful, intelligent, funny, and loving women were still _women_, and thus essentially made of pure evil. "The recruiter - goodness, I wish I could remember his name - came by for a number of years. Luckily - for me, anyway - though they may recruit at a young age, they prefer to have their ninja capable of performing long away missions. My Arashi had to wait a few years until that problem went awa- Naruto, are you alright? You look quite pale."

"I think I want to die." He murmured.

Kakashi was a hard person to read. Because about ninety percent of his body was covered in either spandex, cloth, or bands of weaponry, his reactions could be discerned through the rare vocal emission, the occasional unavoidable physical twitch, and the oddly expressive motions of his one visible eye. Naruto had thought that he'd seen all of these reactions in the short span of less than an hour (though, he had to glance at his watch to realize that his team and his family had been sitting at this fountain for quite a few number of hours, and wondered how Makoto could possibly talk for that long and not get completely bored). He now knew better.

To say that Kakashi was horrified was only telling half the story. To say that he was doubled over in hysterical, near maniacal laughter wasn't describing his actions to their full justice. To say that all three genin (and Haruka) backed away from the very dangerous, unstable man was unnecessary, as all beings with any notion of sense did the same, including a few beings that were not supposed to have any sense, including three rocks that seemed to shuffle away from Kakashi, and the odd tree that seemed to shake despite there being no breeze.

Kakashi was crying. He'd muffle his oddly high pitched giggles, for a few moments and would attempt to straighten up and cover his eye, before _squealing_ and being forced to crouch again. By the end of it, he was moaning almost as if he were in pain.

Makoto frowned. "It's not nice to make fun of him like that, Kakashi. It happens to a lot of boys his age. I'm sure that you-"

All three genin froze in tandem. They glanced at each other with a horror that did not need a name and did not need words. It was a horror that quickly grasped their hearts, their lungs, and the small parts of their brains that contained their survival instincts.

"Sensei," Sakura whispered.

It was the only word the three of them exchanged, and before Kakashi could even finish giving Makoto a look of complete and utter horror that _almost_ matched Naruto's from moments before, the three genin burst into something like laughter.

Rather, Naruto rolled on the ground, clutching his sides in a desperate struggle not to keep his ribs from breaking, Sakura cackled in what couldn't be described as anything other than complete and utter glee, and Sasuke turned his head to one side, disguising what couldn't anything other than _giggles_ as coughs behind one hand.

"Midnight training session." Kakashi growled, suddenly standing, suddenly between all three, and suddenly projecting an Aura of Doom (tm) that poisoned a mile radius. "Now."

Naruto rose to his feet in less time than it took for him to stop laughing, which further doomed him as, when he glanced into Kakashi's glinting, narrowed eye, a few stray giggles eked out of his mouth. "Hmph- I mean, Se-sensei," and his line was interrupted by a badly muted line of snorts, "I have a mission tomorrow. H-hokage's orders."

The blond knew that Kakashi had dogs as summons. He couldn't help but wonder exactly how much time Kakashi spent with those dogs because, with every squeal, squeak, and sputter from Sakura and Sasuke, his expression darkened to the point that he was growling in a manner that even _Naruto_ could translate was "Get out of my Pack. Now."

"What kind of a mission?" Kakashi ventured. He snapped his book shut suddenly, and Naruto would've preferred the crack of a whip instead. The whip promised much less pain than the book did.

"I don't really know the details, actually," Naruto began, scratching the back of his head, "But, he told me that it's something that only _I_ could do, and you're not invited to it, Sasuke."

The Uchiha stopped "laughing".

"Anyway, I'm just supposed to show up at this one address tomorrow." He followed the unspoken command and fished out the number, which was only folded in half three times, shoved in the corner of his bag, and covered in five different colors of lint. He passed it to Kakashi.

While Kakashi stared at the paper for much longer of a time than he actually needed to read it, Naruto realized that he was dealing with silence much better in the last few days (and he marveled at the fact that it _had_ only been about two days for him, and not the three months it really seemed to last) than ever before in his life. He truly, sincerely wished that he didn't need to.

"I see," Kakashi nodded. His tone was somewhere between complete mockery and complete glee. "Well, I won't keep you from your mission. Sakura. Sasuke." He called out quickly. The two genin jumped to their feet, somewhere between a ready stance (in Sasuke's stance) and a "I wonder if I can hide how much I'm laughing" stance, in Sakura's. "Five laps around Konoha. Now."

Sakura moaned and Sasuke let out a snort of protest, but both followed the point of Kakashi's finger, breaking into a swift run.

"Naruto." The sweet, kindly way that Kakashi said his name informed Naruto in no short terms that he was completely and utterly boned, and just hadn't figured out why yet, though the answer was going to come up early in the morning. "I see that you have prior engagements that perform valuable services to Konohagakure as a whole." Kakashi was completely and utterly lying, and was laying it on thick just to spite the genin. "Therefore, I cannot in good conscience take you away from your duties while remaining true to the values of..." he trailed off, scratching at one eyebrow. "You know what? I actually feel bad for you."

Naruto was completely and utterly doomed.

"_You_ can do your laps on another day. Now, which day is it that you have ramen with Iruka-san? Oh, you don't need to tell me, I'll find out from him myself. But, I'm sure that he'll completely understand how you have to perform ten laps around Konoha - as, of course, there's always a penalty for lateness, something my sensei taught me - instead of having dinner with him." Behind Kakashi's mask couldn't be anything other than fangs and a forked tongue. "Training is," and Kakashi actually seemed to smirk under his mask, "oh, whenever my hair appointment finishes tomorrow."

For a moment, Naruto actually _liked_ his sensei, as the older man gave him another quick nod and private smirk. This fondness was quickly caught, beaten, and tied to a stake as the jonin scratched at his cheek in apparent ease.

"Aah. About that favor I owed you?" Kakashi started, and the pit of Naruto's stomach fell out as he realized horrible, horrible truths, "Well, I suppose I can learn about this foreign "Kazama Arashi" fellow. Goodness, I wonder if any of his students are still around? Well, perhaps I can look them up, though it always takes several months of find _anything_, even when you're a jonin. Why, if only there was a better filing system for shinobi information!" Naruto's tongue flopped around in his mouth while Kakashi sighed in mock exasperation and shook his head. "But, since you'll be busy preparing for tomorrow's mission, Naruto, I suppose I'll have to be the one to remind Sakura and Sasuke to look up information on these strange "Obito" and "Rin" personalities."

The silver-haired man paused. "I have to say I'm rather proud of you, Naruto. Why, instead of making Sasuke lose to you in a pre-planned, staged fight in the middle of the town's center square, or having Sakura kiss you in front of the Hokage's tower, you chose instead to ask for aide in scholarly pursuits. It takes a _special_ kind of-"

The rest of Kakashi's speech couldn't be heard over Naruto's screams of utter and complete anguish.

* * *

So, not dead! Hopefully, this chapter is reason enough for all of you to resist killing me. I was lazy about it for one week (as I got a new computer and World of Warcraft), and then got the nasty revelation that I can no longer write this at work. I had been writing between three and seven K there, so you can tell that this is going to change things. Plus, I'm still trying to work timing out with my beta, IEatChicken. If you want to hurt someone, start with her, because she _still_ hasn't updated a fic I'm in love with, "Even Perverts Deserve a Second Chance". 

Anyway, there were some good questions raised in reviews lately. There aren't any romantic pairings in this fic in any chapter in the near future. So far, all my romantic pairings have at least one of the members dead, so I don't need to worry about that. Besides, I'd like to feel confident that I can write the characters before I attempt the tricky process of writing characters in _love_.

The last chapter was pretty much 30 pages to the dot, though my A/N counted as about half a page. I doubt that any chapter will ever, ever be that large again. At least, I really, really hope so.

Also, I know that the latest chapters of Naruto have revealed a lot of things. I want you to know that I'm ignoring all of them. Frankly, I would rather live in blissful ignorance of what's been going on in canon because most fanfiction has better twists and better characterization than what's been going on in the manga. So, Yondaime is Kazama Arashi. It's pretty much the basis of the fic, and it'd be really troublesome to go back and edit this story all to hell. So, I'm channeling my Inner Nara and saying "No".

(1). The last few lines of Makoto's "Kitsune" story were quoted from Wikipedia's entry on (wait for it) "Kitsune". I either made up or paraphrased the rest of that part, but frankly, if I knew a hundred languages I couldn't find a more beautiful way to phrase those lines. So hopefully this counts as enough credit.

But! The usual! I can't believe all the reviews I've gotten, and I really appreciate all your advice. I still want to slap myself for the "Kohona/Konoha" error that was kindly pointed out to me. Special thanks for that. But, I hope you find some lines in this chapter that you like, and I hope that you enjoyed reading this. Thanks!


	12. Special Education

Chapter 12

Naruto heard a pair of feet pass by him once, twice, and eventually four times before he finally opened his eyes. He regretted it, and watched stars on the back of his eyelids for a few moments as he slowly attempted to figure out where he was, what year he was in, and just how much danger was around him with as little pain to his head as possible. He stumbled through the scrambled mess of his own mind for a while until he finally figured out the answer to one of the questions, and it's answer was "none". There was the sound of humming from a nearby room, and that act so so out of place that he spent another few moments trying to double check just where he was. "Makoto?"

The humming stopped. Makoto's steps didn't make as much noise as a normal civilian's footsteps would, but they were certainly louder than a shinobi's steps would be. Naruto came to the conclusion that her footsteps were "soft" when they needed to be, "firm" when they needed to be, and decided that at least _some_ of the loud thumps and crashing noises from last night had been from her, too. It rather reflected her personality, and Naruto decided that he really didn't get any sleep if the first thing he thought about in the morning was feet.

Naruto shifted his head slightly, hoping that his neck was just sore and not broken as it creaked. Makoto watched him, her apron back on and somehow just as spotless as it had been yesterday, despite all the things she'd done the day before. Even this early in the morning, she smelled of tea leaves, coffee grounds, and lavender. He _really_ wanted to know where the hell the lavender came from.

"Oh, did I wake you?" She glanced about, and Naruto thought for a moment about following just what she was looking at. He decided against it in the end. "I thought I was being quiet..."

Naruto shook his head. "Nah, you were. I mean, you didn't wake me up or nothing. I just don't think I got much sleep." The blond rubbed his eyes, scraping out some of the yellow, caked on dirt while untangling his legs enough to slowly stand up. When he finally got his balance back enough not to fall over completely (as there had certainly been some wobbling in the process), he turned his head back to Makoto. "Have you ever had the feeling that something bad is gonna happen?"

Makoto paused. "What kind of bad? The sort of bad where your house burns down, or the sort of bad where they're out of milk at the grocer's?"

Naruto thought for a moment. "I guess I mean the "Ha, fooled you!" sort of bad." At Makoto's slow blink and dawning confusion, he continued. "I mean, it just feels so weird that I met you, you know? I think pretty much everyone has said how completely unlikely it was for us to meet, and there's no doubting that this was a good thing and all. But, for every good thing that's happened to me lately, or well, ever, it seems that there's always something that I didn't figure out at first that always comes back to bite me in the ass at the end."

Makoto pursed her lips. "I'm sure that's not true. Perhaps our meeting was merely an act of karma?"

Naruto mouthed the word. "What's that?"

"It's the idea that all the good you do will eventually be returned to you, and all the bad you do will come back as well."

Naruto shuddered. "Geez. That's exactly what I _don't_ need, Grandma."

The older woman snorted. "I'll ask one day, truly I will."

As if on cue, Naruto's alarm clock began blaring. One foot carefully "nudged" it until it hit the hard frame of Naruto's bed. It carefully dwindled off in volume. Somehow, Naruto was reminded of a whimpering dog. He scowled. "Great. Just what I need. You know, this whole solo mission thing seemed real great yesterday. But, now..."

Makoto laughed. "I believe five in the morning does that to everyone."

For a moment, Naruto forgot that the body tends to blink. "F-five in the morning?"

"Well, you were supposed to be there at seven, correct? You'll need time to first get a nice, soothing shower. That always soothes my nerves whenever I'm nervous. If you'd like, I could run a bath for you and get some of my secret bath salts out. Back home," she began with only a slight break in her voice, "I used to soak for hours and hours until my skin got pruny." She smiled. "The day I realized that I really became old was the day I dried off and the wrinkles remained."

Naruto decided that he never wanted to hear his grandmother talk about bathing ever again.

"After that, I can give you a quick breakfast and a packed lunch before you head off to work. You might need time to search out where you're supposed to be going, after all, and I certainly wouldn't want to make you late." Makoto stretched her arms over her head and Naruto heard cracks at her elbows and fingers. "Aside from that, this early hour gives us a little more time to talk. Haruka had to rush out so early that I could barely get a word in edgewise."

"Oh! That's right! Haruka _did_ say she found a job last night." Naruto stopped for a moment. "Where at?"

He didn't honestly think about how civilians did whatever it was civilians did. Shinobi were just different to him because they were a separate class united by their job (which was doing whichever job the Hokage told them to), and no matter what village they were in, their only rankings were agreed upon - genin, chuunin, jonin, and above. Civilians divided things into High Lords and local lords, village elders and clan elders, and rich people over slightly less rich people (all of whom topped the peasant class, who did all the work). It all just seemed really confusing when, as Shinobi, the better work you did, the better your rank became. With civilians, they might never get out of the "peasant" class, even though they might work more than a dozen lords combined.

There was a startling discharge of thought sparking in between the fleshy folds of Naruto's brain. It hurt, but Naruto actually felt the electricity of the discharge at the startling revelation that, while shinobi consumed goods, it was all civilians who produced them.

Old Man Ichiraku and his daughter were both civilians, even though Naruto _had_ entertained the idea that the old chef was a secret retired ninja as a kid. Civilians made shinobi food, shinobi clothes, and even gave shinobi homes to go back to. Naruto valiantly tried to think about just what he used on a daily basis that he knew a _shinobi_ made, and the only thing he could come up with was the ninja code that all of Konohagakure's shinobi lived by. Even that wasn't actually _real_, as words couldn't really be tasted or touched (though they could be devoured, eaten, and spewed back up again easily enough), and Naruto wasn't sure that shinobi spent the time needed to print the pages, bind the spines, and put them all up on the shelves at the end of the day.

The smartest move that the Shodaime had ever made was setting up the civilian base of Konoha.

The blond realized now that it wasn't just a matter of population. Shinobi were the backbone of Konoha. They brought in money with their missions, defended the village with their lives, and made it their personal goal to make sure Konoha thrived. However, while backbones are well and good to have, they're nothing without flesh and muscle and blood around it, and all of that needed a brain and a heart to actually make the body beat and breathe and move around. If, Naruto struggled with the analogy, shinobi were the backbone of Konoha, and civilians were the flesh around them, the brain of Konoha was the Hokage, and the heart was...

"Would you like coffee before we start, Naruto?"

Naruto groaned. "I kinda think it's illegal for me to be without it. All this thinking is...ow. My head." Naruto tried very, very hard not to think about _anything_ as he stumbled over to the table. "Seriously. My brain is all about feet and spines and all that sort of stuff today. Why am I _thinking?_ It doesn't help me when I'm trying to wake up." A warm mug of coffee materialized in his hand and the steam radiating from it scalded his lips.

Makoto laughed behind her hand. She seated Naruto at the small end of the table, and took a place on the corner nearest to him. "I see you really are all about nerves today, after all." She glanced inexplicably towards the ceiling. "At least you still have that." Before Naruto could question, she set her elbows on the table, one hand skimming around the rim of her own mug as the other propped up her face.

"I used to get so nervous for my Toppu and for my Arashi. At least with Toppu I'd get a few weeks notice before large missions. He sent regular messengers back home, so I knew how things were going with only a few days delay in most cases. But, Arashi? I'd get letters from him that said he began a horribly dangerous mission, and then two or three months might pass by before I get a bundle of letters that explain, "Oh, the mission was awesome! We dove off this three hundred foot cliff and..."." She shook her head. "It was always hard to explain to people how I felt anxious about things that had already happened to him."

Naruto took another sip of coffee. "I guess I can see that. I mean, mainly when I hear about stuff like that, I get excited, you know? Like, did he say where that three hundred foot cliff was? Frankly, that sounds kind of awesome, and I'd love to..." His words slowly trailed off and his hand shook as he set down his coffee. He resisted the urge to duck under the table or crash through the window.

Makoto was _glaring_ at him.

"Naruto!" She barely raised her voice, but Naruto could just _feel_ the implied anger. Her eyebrows were still furrowed, and she wagged one finger in his direction. "I know better than any other mother in this village that being a fighter is dangerous work. I've lost my husband and my son both to battle. However, you are my twelve year old _grandson_, and I don't want you...don't want you..."

She trailed off, and a silence was drawn between them like a velvet curtain. Naruto watched dumbly as Makoto's eyes widened until her blue seemed completely black. Her face whitened, and the pointed finger released as her whole hand fell on the table with a dull thud.

"I don't want you dying."

Her words were faint, and at the end he had to guess her meaning because she didn't voice it out loud. It barely fell on her lips before they began to tremble.

"I know," she continued, which was fortunate because Naruto couldn't swallow the sand that had crawled down his throat, "I know that you are proud to be a shinobi. I can see it in your voice when you speak of it, in your posture when you tell of your missions, and I even see your skill in the face of your team mates. And, it's funny in a way that, the day we met, you told me that it would be dangerous to be around a skilled shinobi. What you need to understand, Naruto, is that it's dangerous to even _love_ a shinobi."

She sat back, and she hid her shaking hands under the table. Her eyes were glued to the wooden platform before her, and Naruto's were glued to her. "Toppu wasn't a shinobi, but so far I've seen that the difference between a mercenary and a shinobi is the way in which they fight. Because, that's what they do. They fight, they battle, they risk their lives for a cause that they may or may not believe in. Naruto, I couldn't ever ask you to stop being a shinobi because it would hurt just as much as if I tried to stop loving Toppu, or Arashi, or Haruka, or..." she trailed off, and Naruto could only see the barest curve of her lips flicker on her face for a second, "you."

"If all Arashi left you were his good looks and his fighting spirit, I would be a monster for asking you to stop." Her eyes were suddenly on him, blazing through him boring through the window behind both of them. "But, it hurts." She raised a hand to her chest, fisting it near her shoulder and her neck. "It hurts to love someone when you know that every day might be their last. It hurts to love someone when they could be dying and you don't know. I've grown used to being around the dead, Naruto. In a way, Toppu isn't gone because I feel as if he walks beside me still. I've already seen signs of Arashi lingering in this village he spent his last breaths defending. What hurts so much is the not knowing. It aches almost as much as knowing in the first place."

"You've spoken about your dangerous missions, your dangerous academy days, your dangerous opponents and the death-defying feats you consider ordinary. It's the not knowing which of those will kill you that ...that..." she broke off, one hand covering her eyes suddenly.

Naruto didn't make a noise as he left his chair. He didn't bump the table, didn't rattle the now luke-warm mugs, and didn't even shift the silverware. His footsteps were silent on the ground, but it took his hands on his grandmother's shoulders for her to react. She twisted, and one of Naruto's hands didn't know where to go because suddenly, she was in his space, on his chest close enough for him to realize the lavender was in her hair. The hand on her shoulder slipped until it reached her back while the other hovered. She fisted handfuls of Naruto's pajamas, and even though each sob was muted to the point where her breathing was the loudest part of the affair, the shinobi had never felt so deafened, so out of place, or so completely helpless.

She murmured something against his chest, and Naruto's hand loosened from where it had twisted in her hair as she pulled back. Her eyes were red, her cheeks were hot and sticky with tears, and she suddenly _looked_ eighty, looked a thousand years old and feeling every day of it from her bones to the center of her teeth. "Promise me something, Naruto. I can't ask you to stop being a ninja, and I can't ask you not to take risks, because that is part of being a ninja as well. I can't stop you from risking your life, and I won't be able to stop you on the day that you do die. But, let me be selfish for once. Please."

"Anything." He would do anything to make her stop crying because it hurt him just as much as he thought it would. It made him helpless, and being helpless made him angry, and being angry didn't help in any way at all because the only one he could be enraged with was himself, which made it worse.

"Promise me that I'll die before you do."

Naruto froze, but Makoto's hands tightened around the collar of his shirt again. Her hair fell in her eyes and stuck to her cheeks. She looked like she was in the throws of a deep sickness that was only now coming to surface, proving its existence in tears and pain and a creeping horror to everyone around her, and Naruto felt every single ounce of her pain and the same creeping horror because his grandmother had just spoken about her own death.

"I've seen my family, my love, and the first of my children pass away. Every day I look at Haruka and wonder if today is the day that she'll leave me, too. And I know, I know that being around me is draining her. I see it in her eyes. Ever since Kichiro, she's become withdrawn and bitter. I just can't deal with it again. I'm not strong enough, Naruto."

"Grandma," he breathed, and the fact that her tears abetted for an instant was a relief unlike any he'd ever known, "I suck with people. I've told you this. Hell, you might have even already seen it for yourself because I'm pretty damn sure that other kids don't call their relatives by their first names. Mak-" he stopped. "_Grandma_, if you think that's awkward for me, imagine how this feels."

There was a pause.

Makoto snickered, or it could've been a choke. One hand loosened at his collar while the other slowly draped itself around his shoulder. She snorted again, but it could've been a sob. "I'm sorry."

"No!" He probably said it with much more force than he intended, but he couldn't help but blurt out the first thing on his tongue as Makoto's head hung again. "It's not your fault. Hell, it might not be my fault. It's probably someone's fault, but they're all already dead and ...man, you know, that's probably not making you feel any better."

Naruto tried to blow back one of the stray hairs that had nudged itself free from his walrus cap. On the fifth attempt, Makoto snickered and tucked the lock back herself. Her fingers felt cold against Naruto's forehead. "Listen," Naruto began again, weighing each word twice before he said anything, "you said that you know that one day, I'll die. Well, I can make you a promise right here and now that there's no way in hell that I'm going to die before I become Hokage. It's a goddamn matter of principle at this point, and you said that Arashi would've crawled through hell to be there when I was born? If I get stabbed with a thousand kunai, I'll live through it because it's not just my goal to become Hokage."

He wished that one day, he could have the same queen-like quality that Makoto could assume at will. Except, of course, that in his case, it would be a _king_-like quality. He wasn't quite sure what the difference was, other than, of course, the obvious one. "It's not just my dream to be even greater than the Yondaime ever dreamed. If it's my destiny to die in some no-name rat hole on a mission gone bad, I'll screw every single stiff-necked, snot-nosed deity up there and live through it anyway because it's not my place to die. Not now, and not then. Hell, if it means that you'll die, I _never_ will, because...geez, I suck with the mushy stuff."

"It's not like I'm gonna die today, Makoto. It really wasn't_ that_ kind of a bad feeling. I'll even cut down on some of my usual stupid risks today. Besides, it takes a hell of a lot to even wound me. I'll be fine, really! So," he trailed off, "can you stop crying? Seriously, I don't know what to do when you do."

She rubbed her eyes under the cover of her hair, and Naruto couldn't help but feel how _small_ she felt. She was still taller and bigger than him, but it didn't feel like it. It was as if she had a bird's hollow bones, and she would just float away there was nothing weighing her down enough.

When he'd first met her, he thought her bones would just poke right out of her skin. If that fact had changed, it had done so by very little, and now it scared him more than the blade of any knife because she was old, she was weary, and she was fragile. He couldn't use delicate, mainly because Sakura had scared him out of associating the word with anything other than glass figurines and china, and "brittle" didn't sound soft enough to include her smile or hard enough to mention how ungodly strong she could be when she was clutching him.

She was worn.

Naruto was used to getting second-hand weapons. He had become accustomed to buying clothes from consignment shops and yard sales, and had long resigned himself to second-rate trade goods and groceries. Makoto was used, like the broken-in leather he used with his weapons and armor. Brand new leather was hard and unyielding, and it certainly sounded like it would be useful as protection except for the fact that it was damn uncomfortable and jabbed everything, no matter where you had it. Second hand leather had been beaten and washed and worn so often that it was soft, and no matter who had it before you, it was familiar because it fit itself to you.

As the Kyuubi-vessel, Naruto hadn't ever thought he'd meet someone who had as rough a life as him. When he finally did it just _had_ to be a family member.

Makoto had lost her home, her parents, her siblings, her husband, her children, and she was living and (Naruto reminded himself) dependant upon a grandson who worked in a profession where any ninja had to be near a god-like level of skill to reach forty.

"Jeez", Naruto muttered, "It's a wonder you can even smile at all anymore."

In response, Makoto leaned back, one hand supportnig her chin for an instant. "It might be cruel for me to say, but whenever something happens in my life like...well, all of the things that have happened in my life," she finished with a bitter smirk, "I always try to remember that no matter what event it is, no matter how badly it effects me, there is always someone out there who is worse off than I am."

A pause.

"Makoto, are you sure that _you_ aren't...?" Naruto rolled his hand.

Shelaughed. "I'm sure. Even after my parents and the rest of my first family died, I still had my health, and I met Toppu. After Arashi and Toppu left us, I still had Haruka, and I gained the support of the entire community. After I lost that, I still had faith, and that faith led me here, to you." She shook her head softly. "No. I can say honestly that I'm in a far better state than most people because no matter where I am, I know that it's a fresh start and a new chance that will make life better."

Naruto stopped. "You know, I don't think many people would say that. I mean, there are some bastards I know - like, well, the Bastard - who can't seem to get past what's happened in their lives. But, well, here you've moved on past like five times what he went through. It's pretty cool, you know?"

The blond had meant to compliment his grandmother, but instead, she frowned. "I wouldn't belittle what he's gone through so quickly, Naruto. He's so young." She stopped, momentarily, one hand pressing against her lips. "Not so very much younger than I was."

Despite the fact that his grandmother seemed to be drawn back into woeful reminiscence, Naruto felt a huge sense of relief that she wasn't angry with him, and felt no small amount of guilt stemming from that same fact. He briefly wondered why she would be. He came to the sudden realization that if he became afraid that everything he said would hurt her, he'd censor what he'd say, and conversations would be a lot less enlightening and much less exciting because without testing his limits with her, he'd never see how far he could go. Besides, it'd never been like him to draw back from a challenge (he wondered if most people would classify "relatives" as a challenge, and decided "yes, they would" for entirely different reasons than him), and Makoto didn't seem like the sort who would shatter into pieces at a thoughtless comment.

This still, of course, didn't change the fact that Naruto would rather gnaw off his own leg than be forced to watch Makoto cry again.

"If you don't want to talk about it, it's totally alright. I'll completely understand, because it's not like Sasuke ever talks about his family or anything. Or, well, _talks_. I mean, I wouldn't even ask because you seem like you cry a lot when you think about that and I _totally_ don't want that happening. But, well, it's not like I can find out from anyone else, or anything."

Makoto inhaled. "Naruto, your point?"

The blond paused. "What were my great-grandparents like? You said _you_ had a grandmother? That means that I had a," he stopped, counting on his fingers for a moment, "great-great-grandparent or something. Geez. That's like two hundred years ago. Anyway, what were they like? What did they do? I bet they were all ninja. Hell, your grandmother was probably the first kunoichi ever, and probably founded the Land of Grass." He nodded. "Yeah, that has to be it."

Makoto _laughed_. Somehow, it was as if her entire depressing conversation about his inevitable death seemed insignificant compared to the way she snorted, and the choke-like noises she made as she tried to stifle it.

She waved one hand in front of her face when Naruto shifted away from her and towards the door. "I'm alright." She stopped for an instant and laughed. "Mostly. I'm trying to imagine Grammy as a ninja. It's not going over well." At Naruto's raised eyebrow, she started speaking with her hands, her words following a few seconds later.

"Grammy was ancient by the time I was born. I was the twelfth child, after all. I'm not sure exactly how old she was because even she seemed to get confused about it, especially near the end. She was the last one of her generation left in our area, and she was the keeper of so many histories and stories that her own seemed to just get mixed up in all of them." Makoto placed one finger on her lip for a moment. "But, if I had to make a guess, I think Grammy was about, oh, ninety or so when the plague came."

Naruto's jaw creaked, swaying back and forth on an invisible both for at least a minute until finally he sat back, supporting his weight with the flats of his hands on the floor. "Damn. Seriously, that's..." he shook his head. "She really _was_ older than ninja. And this was...what, forty years ago?" Makoto nodded, and Naruto whistled. "So, she was born like... crap, math. Okay, so she was born," he flicked a few fingers, tapping a few nails until Makoto raised her eyebrows at him and he got distracted enough that he had to check again, "a hundred and thirty years ago." He glanced up. "There's no way in hell that can be right."

Makoto nodded. "It's close enough, though I am rather worried that you had to use your fingers to reach that. Grammy always seemed old to me." She stopped and snickered. "She was about as old as you thought I was when you first met me, Naruto-kun."

Naruto's mind twisted and worked upon itself, knots and strings of thoughts bunching up and twisting even further until it didn't resemble a ball of yarn as much as a horrible collision between super glue and long hair. Questions kept starting up in Naruto's head and stopping abruptly as they hit huge knots. One managed to push it's way through.

"So, what the hell did she _do?_" Makoto drew back a fraction of an inch, and Naruto waved his hand as a retraction. "I mean, she was so damn old - older this this whole _village_ - and ...well, geez. First off, _how_, and secondly, what did she do as a job?"

Makoto seemed to be weighing her words, which confused Naruto. "People, Naruto, get old. Some people die of violence, some people die peacefully, but all people share the fact that one day, their time will come. Grammy wasn't ever a ninja. She didn't live long enough to see a single war in our region. If it weren't for the plague, I'm sure that she would've lived at least another decade to see Arashi's birth."

The blond ran his hand through his hair. "Whoa. I knew about the whole "Old" thing. The Sandaime's pretty damn up there - sixty or something - and I thought _he_ predated rocks. But, holy crap. I didn't know that people could actually _get_ that old."

"It takes a special sort of person to live that long, and saying that Grammy was "special" was like saying that you might get a wee bit wet in a monsoon." Naruto raised his eyebrow. "It means that it's a massive understatement."

She glanced at the window, and Naruto followed her gaze. The sky was a rather uniform gray color, with slightly darker clouds hanging high in the sky while cotton-thin wispy clouds lurked close to the village. To make things worse, the previous day had been hot, and the previous night (Naruto vaguely remembered getting home sometime after Haruka began falling asleep on her mother's shoulder, and it wasn't just a typical night's chill that had lasted then) had been a precursor to the chill and humidity that Naruto was facing today. Worse yet was the inevitable arrival of fog. Ever since the whole bridge mission, ever since the Wave...ever since Haku... he hadn't had a good relationship with fog.

"Well!" Makoto exclaimed, straightening up and failing to hide all of her creaks, cracks, hisses, and moans from Naruto's enhanced ears. "Do you feel like a quick breakfast? I could try to remember the story of exactly how Grammy ended our family's feud with the Namikaze family."

Naruto perked up. "Feud? That means there were battles and stuff, too? Okay, if she wasn't a ninja, she had to have been a mercenary or something, right?"

Makoto laughed, and turned back to lock her eyes with Naruto's. "Arashi's child," she began, and Naruto wondered exactly how that became a term of endearment (and then decided that he didn't care because it actually _was_ a term of endearment), "I can tell you honestly at this very moment that my Arashi was the first one in the history of the Kazama clan to ever be a fighter of any kind. Barring, of course, my uncle Sanji, who was our town's sheriff for a few years. Somehow, however, I don't believe you consider that the same as being a shinobi."

Naruto frowned. "Wait, if Arashi was the first fighter, where the hell does that leave Toppu? He was a mercenary."

"Ah," Makoto murmured with a smile, "you caught that. Arashi was the first fighter in the history of the Kazama clan. Toppu _wasn't_ from the Kazama family. He merely took my name after our marriage."

"Wait, guys can _do_ that?" He paused. "Wait, why would he want to? I mean, when I marry Sakura-chan, she'll be Uzumaki Sakura, and that just sounds awesome." Makoto glared at him again, and Naruto quickly filtered his statement through three layers of his brain before scratching the back of his head sheepishly. "I mean, if she wants to. Anyway, why the hell did he change it? What was it before?"

Naruto classified that as another "Things I don't want to ask Makoto because she looks wistful when I do" topic, as the woman curled one hand around her cheek. "That is yet another thing in Toppu's life that was mysterious. I might've been his wife, and Arashi and Haruka certainly were his children, but that didn't change the fact that there were some things he wouldn't reveal about himself to anyone. It's the same as how there are things, secret, wonderful things, that he revealed to me. These small details were so important to him that the mere fact that he trusted me with them makes them precious to me, also. What I'm trying to say is that..." she trailed off at Naruto's inquisitive glance.

"Let me try it this way. Toppu and I have shared so much over the years. Among our stories, our secrets, and our years together, we also grew to prize the same qualities in people. It's always been odd that Toppu treasured honesty to such a degree when he held so much of his own life secret. But, because he treasured his truths just as much as his secrets, when he finally told you something precious, it showed that he treasured _you_." She pressed her pinky between her lips and closed her eyes, and Naruto wondered just why it made her look younger. It probably had something to do with the nervous tension he could smell off her skin, or the way that she kept shifting her feet in minute ways. "It's not that I don't treasure you, Naruto. Two, three days into this and I've already...well, we're doing well for making this all up, I'd think."

Naruto nodded. "I get it. Whatever stuff you have inside of you, or whatever Haruka might know, or even what Pop know about Toppu..well, that was Toppu's business, right?" He paused. "Damn. The bastard had to kick the bucket before I could even jump him for details."

Makoto blinked and opened her mouth to say something. "When you call your..." Instead of continuing, she shook her head. "I keep forgetting that you raised yourself. I was going to chastise your guardian, but there's only you and," she continued with a shake of her head and a snort, "I can't rightly blame you."

"Huh? What's wrong with calling Arashi "Pop"?"

Makoto's face seemed for a moment frozen in between a laugh and a grimace. "You have odd terms of endearment, child."

"Right back at you. Anyway, what kinda food can I help you make?" The blond glanced around, walking over to the partisan of his kitchen and peeking his head through the curtain. "Geez. I can't believe it's stayed clean this long. Anyway, what do we have left? I know how to cook water, so if you want boiled eggs, I might be able to swing it. The last couple times I tried, there were ...well, explosions, but hey, I'm sure I'm better than that now."

"Explosions?" The blonde woman mouthed. She shook her head and set her hair flying everywhere. "We'll make tea and biscuits. Grammy showed me the perfect recipe, and the real trick of it is to use two sticks of butter and some marmalade..."

* * *

"...Of course," Makoto waved with one hand, narrowly missing flinging jam on the walls, "Grammy couldn't help but wipe the smudges off the "little hellion's" face. Little did _she_ know that the "little hellion" was actually the High Lord's missing son." 

Naruto stopped mid bite, cheeks puffed out with buttered muffin. "Moh gwai!" Crumbs of muffin splayed over the entire table. He reached for the napkins with reddened cheeks at about the same time that Makoto passed him a cup of now lukewarm tea with giggled badly disguised by her biscuit-free hand. He jumped up on the table, careful not to get too much of his bare feet on the still-shining wood. He concentrated a little bit of chakra into the deepest parts of his fingers, vacuuming all the bits of muffin (and leftover egg, and tiny pieces of biscuit) into the rag about ten times more quickly than he could've otherwise. Makoto laughed while he tried - and failed - to avoid watching her.

"Yes, she did. The High Lord was so thankful to her that he promised her anything she could ever desire." His grandmother held up one hand. "Wait for it."

"Let me guess, revenge on their family? I mean, they _were_ the ones who put that into the village's well." Naruto found the perfect angle to throw away the crumb filled rag and managed to land it into the trashcan from only thirty feet away, through the sliver of the kitchen's curtain. "I mean, it has to be either that or ...wait, you can't mean the spindly-spined skinny bookworm nerd and..."

"Yes, exactly! Grammy asked the High Lord if he would "do her the honor" of presiding over her daughter's wedding...her wedding to the heir of the Namikaze's." Blonde hair flew everywhere as she shook her head. "Of course, my aunt hadn't ever even _heard_ of Minato before. She had been too busy training her newest pack of hunting dogs and presiding over the local hunting lodge's annual alcohol festival to care about the family feud. The Namikaze couldn't object because they were too concerned about appearing weak in front of the High Lord. So, the wedding took place exactly halfway between the two estates, a new well was drilled, and my aunt moved _one_ of her packs of dogs to each home so she could be by something familiar no matter where she went. This, of course, _included_ the Namikaze estate."

"Heh. Bet they just _loved_ that." Naruto sucked the last of the crumbs off his fingers before reclining back in his chair comfortably. "Man. I didn't know biscuits could taste so good. You said that Grammy made those up herself? Lies. I bet it's some ten thousand year old recipe that she found buried in some ancient ruins and... hey, you don't need to laugh at me! It could've happened!"

"No, no! Not laughing at you." She paused. "Well..." Naruto pouted, and Makoto snickered. "Alright, alright. You just think of the cutest little scenerios, Naruto. You have such the active imagination. It reminds me of, well, of your father, of course, because sometimes it seems like your name is the only thing different, but mainly of Haruka. _She_ could dream an entire world for herself. I wish I still had her writings, but I gave them to Arashi for safekeeping long ago." Naruto thought it was completely unfair that Makoto was entertaining even when she was telling a _story_ about a story while he couldn't hold Sakura's attention long enough to find a way _not_ to get smacked by her.

Naruto was finding the oddest things enjoyable lately. He'd been eating and enjoying breakfast for the second day in a row, freshly laundered clothes really _did_ feel better than clothes that had been "broken in" for a week, and the odd companionable silence was actually rather relaxing.

"Minato", Naruto stated after the "companionable silence" ran too long for his tastes, "is a really stupid name." Makoto glanced at him. "Seriously! Geez, it sounds so girly. Might as well have called him "Momo" from the way you described him. Might've "manly"-ied him up a bit."

Makoto shook his head. "This might come to you as a surprise, Naruto, but that was my first choice for your father's name."

A small vessel in Naruto's jaw felt like it exploded. "W-what?!" He was glad for what had to be the first time in his entire life that he _wasn't_ in Ichiraku's, as his outburst was most assuredly a Class A violation of Rule Number 8, which resulted in either a humiliating act of repentance, or smaller portions for a week.

The fact that Number 47a of the Great Ramen Charter had been revised by the Hokage himself to state "Naruto Uzumaki is not allowed to participate in any dare, challenge, or contest that breaks any of Konoha's rules lest there be **consequences**"it was underlined, bolded, and circled twice on the actual document), "Nor shall any punishments issued because of violations of the Great Charter involve unreasonable property destruction", (as, whenever ninja are involved, even if it's something as simple as walking to the store to buy eggs, something _will_ be destroyed), "unreasonable body harm to civilian citizens of Konoha, or the usage of decaf coffee."

That last amendment was the key ingredient in the prank that Naruto rated as his second of all time. By order of Sarutobi himself, Naruto was forbidden to speak of it to anyone who didn't witness it themselves, but the old man didn't hesitate to put it on as many binding documents as he could if it meant that Naruto had less opportunity to use it.

"Toppu suggested names like "Yusuke", "Kazuma", and "Kurama". "Strong masculine names"." If Toppu sounded anything like how Makoto played it, he had been as gruff as if he'd smoked cigars every day from his birth on up, or as if he'd spent an entire week screaming and his throat had never healed up. "He didn't like "Mamoru" or "Yukito", and I think I was already about three days over my due date before we finally got a sign."

Naruto nodded. "Let me guess - a huge thunderstorm that scared the crap out of you and put you into labor?"

Makoto shook her head. "No, we were eating out at a restaurant, and we both got the same fortune cookie."

"...you're kidding me, right?" Naruto's hopes rose when Makoto laughed, but they were shortly stomped on thoroughly as Makoto shook her head. He sighed. "Okay, so what was the fortune?"

In response, she placed one finger on her lips. "I could swear that one copy of it survived, and it could be in with our pictures. But, I still remember it. "A storm approaches"."

Naruto had to attempt to speak twice before it came out halfway decent. "That's it?"

Makoto nodded briskly. "On the wagon ride home, my water broke and- why are you making that face?"

Naruto shuddered. "Pregnant people are scary."

There are some mixtures of emotions which human faces are not capable of expressing, while other expressions can be read a dozen ways and still have possibilities left over. It was no fault of Makoto's that her face was flashing and contorting in ways best left to the professionals, though even the professionals would have trouble expression shock, horror, laugher, and something akin to wonder simultaneously. _She_ had to try a few times to get her lips back under control, and the only word she could choke out was "Why?!".

Naruto scratched the back of his head. "I mean, ew. Squishy things everywhere, and liquids, and just the whole creepy "Eating anything" ability. There was this woman - forget her name - who ate nothing but Ichiraku's ramen while she was knocked up. Now, that I can appreciate. We probably would've gotten along great if she hadn't insisted on eating shrimp ramen with green tea flavored cake from one of the nearby stands." Naruto shuddered. "Ew. It gave me nightmares for a _month_." Makoto was glancing at him with an expression that showed _some_ sort of emotion to the highest degree possible. The twelve year old was certain that one day, he'd discover what it meant. He wasn't sure if he was looking forward to that day or not.

"And, I mean," he continued as Makoto looked like she needed time to remember how to breathe (making Naruto wondered if that was just as much a family trait as blond hair), "there's the whole baby thing." Makoto fanned herself with one hand, pink that had risen to her cheeks from laughter (or shock, or a mixture of the two), starting to fade. Naruto took it as a sign to continue. "I mean, they just _appear_."

Makoto's hand stopped mid-fan, drooping at the wrist as if her body had no will to support it. Her head twisted in his direction so quickly that he thought it would break her neck and fly off into the far distance, and her eyes were so wide that Naruto thought he could see his own reflection in them. Nothing short of unadulterated _horror_ was plastered on her features.

"You-you mean...no one's _told_ you?" She began, stuttering on the words as if the very concept was gruesome.

The kyuubi-vessel got a queasy feeling in his belly. It could've been the muffins, could've been a sudden sense of anxiety rushing forth, and it could've been the Kyuubi laughing at him.

It wasn't the muffins.

Just as Naruto was about to ask for a wee bit of clarification, both blondes reflexively turned their heads, hearing something that wasn't quite right. Later, the kyuubi-vessel would classify it as somewhere between a metallic moan and the gurgle of someone trapped in a pit of liquid mercury. In either case, Naruto stood straight, his joints having the predisposition of freezing in the oddest positions, then slowly investigated the noise.

He found his alarm clock half buried under his bed, one arm bent at a ninety degree angle while the other was caught on his bed spread. He numbly untangled the hour hand until the entire clock wrestled free, then turned the face of it to Makoto.

"It says that it's seven now."

Makoto glanced at Naruto. Naruto stared back. For a moment, there was nothing but the dying breaths of Naruto's most treacherous alarm clock.

"How quickly can you take a shower?" Makoto questioned, her eyes just as wide as Naruto's.

"My record's four minutes." His hand involuntarily clenched, but he couldn't even find the will to curse as some of the gears stuck in his thumb.

"Break it."

There was an explosion of movement. Naruto didn't know that old ladies could move faster than ninja, but Makoto broke all rules of logic as she crammed him into the shower room. He didn't have time to close the door as he stripped, but he figured that, as a mother and a wife, she'd seen worse than his scrawny legs, and he thanked whatever spirits there were that ninja didn't wear anything but sandals, as he just knew socks would've slowed him down an extra few seconds that he didn't have to spare.

He still had soap bubbles running into his eyes when he ran a towel over his chest, behind his ears, and over his feet. He knew he was forgetting something, but as Makoto knocked loudly once before pushing the bundle of his uniform into his hands, he didn't have time to care about it.

He was considerably slower putting _on_ clothes than taking them off, and he desperately decided at that moment he would make a special ninja jutsu that would teleport him into clothes. He barely had time to rationalize the fact that since people like Maito Gai and Lee Rock existed, the technique had to already exist, as there was no other way they could get into skin-tight bodysuits like that without alien, divine, or chakra-infused aid.

Makoto had time to cram a suspiciously large package into her courier's bag, strap it over Naruto's shoulder, and kiss him on the cheek before Naruto leaped from the window. For a perilous moment, he was suspended midair, and he wondered briefly if he'd misjudged his usual jumping spot. But, a moment later, his sandals found the power line that ran to his neighbor's apartment (where it powered the building's radio) and he dashed along with it. He didn't even need to put chakra in his feet, as he found that the momentum alone was enough to keep him balanced.

For a moment, the fact that he was dripping wet, flinging droplets of soapy water in his wake as he dashed on working wires seemed to tug at a part of his brain. He remembered something about "electricity", "danger", and "death", and dismissed the whole train of thought as he just didn't have time to die right now.

One hand dug frantically through his bag while Naruto's feet led themselves over rooftops, sliding on loose tiles. His other hand acted as a balance and, more frequently, a safety line, as it seemed to have the good sense to grab onto nearby radio antennas, flagpoles, and laundry lines. Falling three stories wouldn't kill him, but if he sprained his ankle from it, it wouldn't just slow him down, it would serve as a lousy excuse as to why he was late in the first place. Naruto decided long ago that Kakashi-sensei had more than Konoha's need for "lousy excuses" well covered and, despite the fact that they _might _of all been training, it didn't make the excuses any better.

He wondered why the hell people ever organized anything in the first place because ever since he'd cleaned all the junk out of his bag last night under Makoto's watchful gaze, he couldn't find anything. After agonizing minutes, Naruto's fingers found and pulled out the slip of paper littered with the Hokage's hasty handwriting.

The morning light didn't make the numbers any neater, and the hair hanging over his eyes didn't help him to make out the words. Inside of his mind, there wasn't room for much of anything except a constant string of curses that echoed through the huge cavern of his mind like the chant of a particularly drunk, malevolent group of monks.

"Screw it." He was getting very familiar with the Kage Bunshin jutsu lately, and he was particularly thankful that it only took one hand symbol. His fingers found it easily, the words fell freshly from his lips, and when ten Kage Bunshin poofed around him, he wasn't particularly surprised, only registering mild interest at the fact that he only put a tiny bit of energy into the spell and they were equally split between white-outfit and his long-lost, beloved orange suit.

"Alright. I need to find this address." Naruto knew that since he'd read it before he created the jutsu, and since he'd read it the day before, his clones wouldn't need to see the paper to know what he was talking about.

"You bet you do, boss. I mean, Glasses' been waiting there for _hours_." It wasn't one of his named clones who started the chase, bounding across the rooftops going approximately ninety degrees to the left of where Naruto had been aimed.

"Wait, _what?!"_. Naruto couldn't even skid to a halt because another nameless clone elbowed him in the back - a signal that translated to "Faster, dammit!" in civilian, shinobi, and possibly three different animal languages. "What the hell do you mean that he's already...there."

The roof gave a good vantage point of the empty ANBU surveillance station across the street, the eastern forest, and the gathering of people clustered around the front of a building. Naruto didn't even need to glance at the street numbers (which was good, because he couldn't find any) to know that _this_ was where he was supposed to be. Glasses - because the clone glanced up at him and pushed his fingers to his nose in an imperious, arrogant, familiar maneuver - leaned coolly against the front door of the building. It took a moment before the clone sniffed and turned his gaze back to his book - Naruto distantly recognized the green cover as "Proclamations of the Fire Lord".

One of his nameless clones elbowed him again, and Naruto could only concentrate on how amazing it was that the elbow had so many things to say ("Shut up", "Speed up", "Out of my way", and "Hurry up" being only a few of them), and not the fact that all was _not well_ with his clones.

He didn't remember creating Glasses lately. If he _had_ created clones, he was almost positive that Glasses wouldn't have been one of them, as the creepy in-mind incident at the park yesterday still creeped him out. Worse than the fact that he didn't remember creating Glasses was the fact that the clones he _knew_ he had just created _did_ know about it. Logically, they should not have been able to know anything that Naruto didn't, and vice versa. There were only a few explanations for a phenomenon like this, and two of them involved things he didn't want to think about (evil clones and the Kyuubi, and any mixture of the two), while one of the others seemed appealing.

The answer was simple. "Worry about it later".

Naruto finally took the hint and leaped from the rooftop, first onto a rather wide window ledge, then to the tip of a flagpole, and then finally to the ground. He landed with a soft thump and a small cloud of dust, but despite the fact that it was, by a high degree, one of the stealthiest maneuvers he'd ever pulled off, it didn't stop the back row of the crowd from turning to glance at him.

Of _course_ he had to see someone he recognized.

"U-Uzumaki-sama!" The Hokage's secretary was dressed oddly for the weather. Despite the fact that, for summer, it was downright chilly, she wore a short skirt and a blouse that just had to have ripped lately, because it practically dived all the way from her neck down to her stomach. The blond resisted the urge to dig out some of his spare safety pins and hand them to her, as the chances were good that getting too close to her would be a _bad idea_.

This hypothesis was proven completely correct less than a minute later as she rushed in front of him. Naruto hadn't ever heard of a teleportation jutsu, but he figured it was a bloodline limit isolated to her family, as she was twenty feet away in one instant, and _there_ the next.

"It's you! Oh, I _knew_ the Hokage-sama would approach you about this. No one else in Konoha would ever dream of trying it again but you! Oh, when I first read about what you did to BIRCH, I just _knew_ that it would be the start of something amazing. But, my Pappy and Great-Pappy, they told me about _how_ you did it, and I just couldn't believe it! Oh, I know now that I never, _ever_ should have doubted you, Uzumaki-sama! Never again, I promise!" She seemed to bounce on the spot, her gestures wide, enthusiastic, and very, very dangerous.

Naruto's mind whirred and clicked for a moment. It sounded like the puttering of a generator that hadn't been used for years, suddenly revealed to the light and dusted off for the first time. Even if it was only inside of Naruto's mind, there was smoke, there was grinding, and there was a momentary acrid smell of something burning.

"Wait, BIRCH? I was there the other day. What did I do that was so special? I mean, I just sorted paperwor-" His own horror froze his thoughts. Just because the generator was _running_ didn't help if all the light bulbs in the house suddenly blew from the overload. That bad feeling that had birthed inside of his mind and lurked in his thoughts had a name, location, and profession.

"Exactly! I never _dared _to go in there myself - it was always Ichiro who lost the office's bet. But you! Why, I don't know what we're going to have to have him do now that everything's sorted and labeled, and..." she trailed off, bending her head down shyly as she tried to look up at Naruto through half-lidded lashes (which didn't work well as Naruto was still two feet shorter than her). "I went there with some of the other girls in the office yesterday. They just didn't believe me when I told them and, more than that, I think I needed to see it for myself."

"Uzumaki-sama", she breathed, apparently oblivious to the fact that Naruto was twitching with every worshiping syllable, "you did read my note last night, right?"

"There you are." Glasses' haughty tone sang through the street like choirs of birds and flocks of angels.

"Oh, it's about damn time!" Naruto breathed, all his muscles (which were inexplicably tense) relaxing in a fell swoop. He didn't know what Glasses was. He knew who Glasses started out as (which was "a jerk"), knew who Glasses had been in the middle ("an even bigger jerk"), and while he didn't know who Glasses had been yesterday, he had a creepy idea that involved tails. Naruto knew, however, exactly who Glasses was at that very instant.

His savior.

"Sorry, gotta go right now." The Fangirl (because Naruto realized with no small amount of horror that where there was one, there were _many_, but this one would always be _THE_ fangirl) pouted, and moved her arm in a motion Naruto recognized as aiming to hook his arm in hers. He managed to side step away just in time, and he almost had to jog to keep up with Glasses' impatient steps.

The crowd around the building was thick with faces, some new, some old, and Naruto dedicated a section of his mind to remembering where he'd seem them before. There were balding men with bushy eyebrows staring at him with adoring eyes that churned his stomach, younger men who looked only a few years older than him who were glancing at him with disbelief, and several young and not-so-young (which was followed by "had forgotten the meaning of "young"") women who kept winking at him.

Glasses cleared his throat. "What happened yesterday?".

The question stopped Naruto for a moment. "What?" Before Glasses could do more than roll his head and sigh, Naruto raised one of his hands. "No, I mean, I thought _you_ knew."

Naruto briefly pondered just how independent his clones were. He didn't know anything close to the real reason why they started behaving the way they did. He still didn't get the differences between his orange suited ones and the clones who wore his current white suit. He thought that Foreman might've been his first "independent" clone, as he usually used Foreman to watch any others. If any clone was his "main copy", he was it. Foreman knew how to organize groups, could think about a dozen of them at a time, and always kept track of what exactly he was supposed to be doing. All of these were traits that Naruto desperately wanted to have.

The exact _opposite_ was true with Glasses. He was arrogant, derogatory, and bookish, and Naruto was pretty sure he didn't possess enough of _any_ of those qualities to fill up a whole arm, let alone a whole body. While Foreman had multiple uses as a team leader, a fighter, and a brain stormer, Glasses' only use seemed to be thinking quicker than Naruto could. The Original wasn't sure if he'd ever used Glasses in an actual battle, and he actually got the feeling that Glasses would pull a Nara and "run out of energy" as the battle got into the thick of it.

The idea that Glasses was asking _him_ what was going on was ludicrous, and it must've shown on his face because the clone snapped the spine of his book shut sharply. The two blonds glanced at each other, Glasses through half-lidded eyes almost drowsy with boredom and Naruto with complete and utter incomprehension.

"So," Naruto began, scratching the back of his head while leaning a few inches closer to his clone. "As long as we both have no clue whatsoever what the hell's going on, can you agree not to do anything weird, like attack the town or ...eat rabbits or something, and I'll agree not to.. uh..."

"Horrible bargaining skills. You have no tact whatsoever. Your complete lack of subtlety is a shame to our name, Uzumaki Naruto." Naruto couldn't resist a snarl, and Glasses couldn't (or, more accurately, didn't try to) resist portraying all the traits he just insulted as he continued with a small shake of his head. "In so much as I can do so, I will swear not to rampage through the village on a massive spree of fury-driven destruction, intentionally harm any shinobi designated as friendly beyond reason or civilian without cause, or," he continued with a tilt of his head that _screamed_ "I would be looking down on you if I was tall enough","chase and eat rabbits. In exchange," he added, "I ask only for differentiation from our other copies."

Naruto's drawn lip showed his fang as he hissed. "What do you want? A crown?"

Glasses shook his head. "Fool. I'm sure you'll think of "something" appropriate." The clone glanced once more at the crowd, who seemed to be horrible at pretending they weren't trying to listen into the conversation between the two Naruto's in front of them. Fangirl was the exception, as her eyes were never anywhere but fastened on the Original, save for the few occasions when her eyes drifted towards Glasses.

"So," Naruto began, "Where the hell is the Old Man? He said seven, right? You didn't screw up the address?"

"Oh, please." Glasses dismissed, opening up the book again and licking one finger to turn a page. "I've been here since four. ANBU have been monitoring this location since roughly five, and no one with an ounce of sense would believe that they haven't informed the Hokage of my location." The clone glanced around the crowd for a moment before turning back to his maker with a raised eyebrow. "Somehow, I'm led to believe that the delay lies in the fact that three quarters of the Hokage's Tower took the day off to kneel at your feet."

"They're not kneeling!" Naruto interjected. He shuddered and leaned conspiratorially closer. "Geez. Don't give 'em ideas, alright? That would just be ten degrees of creepy, right there."

Glasses glanced at him for a moment, then nodded. "Agreed."

There was the sound of Glasses turning another page in his book, and Naruto had to focus on _not_ concentrating on the murmurs of the crowd. Most of them were muttering something along the lines of "Where is he?" to "He couldn't really have...", with the occasional, "Orange Jumpsuit, right?" mixed in.

Yesterday, Naruto had found out that it wasn't just his jumpsuit that he was judged by, but his actions and behaviors as well. He was remembered for just the same reason (granted, however, was the fact that some of the actions he was judged by weren't _his_), and changing his reactions - and changing his clothes - left him unrecognizable.

He was still stunned at the degree to which this was true. He and his _clone_ were chatting away in the doorway in front of the government office with roughly two in a hundred faces actually showing something like puzzlement about that fact. He decided that he recognized one of the "enlightened" faces as working in the office a few rooms down from the Hokage's. The blond couldn't remember who, if anyone, he had passed last night, but it appeared that the only ones who knew that _he_ was the strange blond in the white sweatshirt were the ones who had actually been around him long enough or close enough to see that Naruto was Naruto, orange or not.

The blond felt something that could be described as either a small tingle or a sharp stabbing pain, depending on what grade of shinobi was asked to classify it. Naruto called it a nuisance, quickly blocked out by the Kyuubi who, the vessel had decided a few months ago, only blocked out pain when he was feeling either generous (which was rarely) or bored (which was quite often). He glanced to Glasses, who peered over his nose at his maker.

"Ah. One of the clones on the rooftops saw the Hokage and his entourage heading this way. Should arrive in a minute or two." The Original saw Glasses pause and stare off into the distance for long enough that Naruto was tempted to see what the hell was going on. Instead, he waited, and an instant later, the clone nodded sharply, almost as if he had decided something for himself. With eyes locked onto Naruto, the clone passed the book into Naruto's empty hands.

"You'll need me in here." The clone glanced towards the dark windows, one half-covered by yellow, peeling newspaper while the other was badly curtained by rotting red drapes. "Don't be a coward about using me. Or," he continued despite Naruto's growl, "Us." There was a pause while Glasses ran one hand through his hair (making it seemed oiled back somehow), before the clone frowned one side of his mouth. "Then again, you might want to learn a new trick or two. I believe we'd _all_ appreciate that."

"Hey!" Naruto couldn't get another word in before his clone stepped forward. The blond came to the conclusion that, aside from being intelligent in a way that seemed to be present in no other way in Naruto's history, the other "admirable" trait Glasses had was _purpose_. The Original had a goal, a dream, and a destiny, and even though each of these things were the same, there were moments when, in the thick of battle or in the deep silence of the night, he'd lose track of them and wonder if really, that's what he was supposed to be. But, Glasses stepped as if he knew that his feet would land exactly where they needed to, and he'd do exactly what he'd need to do. He _knew_ why he was the way he was and, even though it was only because he argued with and insulted the person who made him on a nigh-daily basis, at least Glasses could ask his maker some questions (if, of course, he could ever stop insulting his maker in the first place).

For a moment, Naruto couldn't help but try to figure out exactly why his creation seemed to radiate certainty in the exact same way that the Hokage radiated wisdom, or Ichiraku's radiated safety. He didn't have more than a moment to glance at the neutral expression on his clone's face before Glasses drug up one of Naruto's unresisting hands. Naruto got the hint and followed Glasses' leading hand to the middle of the clone's forehead. "See ya."

The small poof of the clone's dissipation was disguised by the sudden chatter of the crowd as they distinctly parted an aisle. The SAP office - as Naruto had glanced at the yellowed newspaper which telltale tears, creases, and stains over the letters "S", "A", and "P", and glistened their meaning, (though he had no idea what they stood for) - sat at the center of a large U-bend in the road. It sat a small bit recessed from the rest of the buildings on the street, and the others in the row were painted with bright colors and lavish decorations to draw attention away from the small, squat, and dark building in a way that, frankly, announced it's importance from the rooftops with large neon banners.

It's position made it easy to defend, easy to hide, and easy to scout from, as Naruto could clearly see the Hokage's white robes and the ANBU around him's dark suits pass through the crowd, who bowed, or, in most cases, coughed unconvincingly. There seemed to be a sudden rush for the nearest pharmacies as even Naruto could pick up the fact that the Hokage was neither convinced nor amused by their performances.

All too soon, Naruto was left alone with the Hokage, his guards, and the complete encyclopedic knowledge of "Proclamations of the Fire Lord", which Glasses had been rereading and pretending to read since the wee hours of the morning. He wasn't sure which he was more displeased about.

Naruto crossed his arms sourly as Sarutobi marched the last few steps up to the office. Beside him, dwarfed by the ANBU, was a crooked old man who was bald, stout, and who greatly resembled a bulldog. The only real difference between the man and an _actual_ bulldog was the possibility that underneath the long, grime-encrusted robes, the old man _could_ be walking on two feet.

Sarutobi stopped within a few paces of Naruto. There was a great pause, and Naruto tapped his foot. "You're late, you old coot. What, couldn't find your dentures again?"

The squat old man gasped in horror, and one of the ANBU might've shifted his weight onto the other foot, but the Hokage smirked. "You should be used to that by now, Naruto. As I understand it, Team 7 and their sensei never meet until hours after the set time."

Naruto felt the blood halt in his veins. It didn't precisely freeze, as it was more to the effect that his heart didn't have the will to keep on beating. Sarutobi knew for a fact that Kakashi feigned tardiness. He hadn't said that _Kakashi_ was late, only that the team didn't _find_ him until late. The worst part of it was that, if Naruto hadn't known already, he wouldn't have caught the hint. Naruto swallowed his reactions until his scowl felt legitimate and tapped one finger on his arm impatiently. "I notice you didn't say anything about your dentures, though. Where were they - under the couch? Or did Konohamaru _really_ pull that trick with the super glue?"

Sarutobi's eyes widened. "_YOU_ were the one who told hi-" he stopped halfway through the question, suddenly aware of the slight shifting of the ANBU around him, and most certainly aware of Naruto's superior smirk. He coughed. "Your mission." The ANBU stood straighter (though, it took training, natural skill, and years of being surrounded by them to tell the difference), and the Hokage stepped forward with a familiar enviable purpose. "Inside of this building lies one of Konoha's greatest mysteries and threats. There are people - fine shinobi in their own right - who train for years and never reach the level needed to survive this threat. You could say that it's an obstacle course of sorts. Many trials await you ins-"

"It's office work, isn't it?" Naruto interrupted. "Sorting papers and crap, because you're either too lazy or too busy finding new ways to be lazy to do it yourself. And, none of the guys you work with want to do it either, so it just keeps getting worse and worse."

The fact that Sarutobi's eyes widened at all showed Naruto just how on the mark he was. The blond sighed, uncrossing his arms as he shook his head. "I bet Kakashi knew about this too, the bastard. Bet he was laughing all the way home." He scowled, more to himself than to the Hokage, but jerked his head up sharply before the Hokage could scratch the side of his face. "I have a mission with him today. At, you know, Noon."

Sarutobi hid what _had_ to be a smirk behind a hand gesture. "Ah. Should I release you at two, or three then?"

Naruto thought for a moment, stretching back on the balls of his feet until it looked like he would topple over. "Eh, I better be there early to wait." He stopped, and added lightly, "For Sakura-chan, you know?"

The Sandaime studied Naruto for a moment, his eyes weighing deeply on Naruto's shoulders, staying on his hands, and then lifting back up to bore holes entirely through Naruto's skull. "Ah. I see." The smirk pulling at the Sandaime's lips proved that, perhaps he really did. The old man straightened again, this time turning his head in the direction of what simply had to be the SAP Office's attendant. "If you would, I would like to gage the difficulty of this mission with my own eyes. Unlock the door."

"B-but, Hokage-sama!" Naruto quickly categorized the man as a particularly talented talking frog, because as the sun caught the unshed tears in the lackey's eyes, Naruto realized that no human could have such small, beady eyes, or have such oily, unwashed skin. It looked for all the world that the man was an over-waxed kunai, and any moment the clothes would just fall off.

Despite himself, Naruto couldn't help the horror that crept over his face. Before the Sandaime could get a good look at him, he shuddered, curled one particularly sharp claw into his palm, and hoped that visions of unspeakable horror would go away under pain, just like particularly evil genjutsus.

The attendant stumbled (though, the word Naruto had been searching for was "hopped") over to the door, fumbling twice with a large, black pronged key that only shifted after the shinobi infused a small amount of chakra into it. The door parted with a foreboding creak that only _coincidentally_ sounded like a shrill woman's shriek of horror. The door pivoted on it's hinges while all present gazed in horrified fascination.

The fox was a demon, and it was certainly evil by the terms of Konoha, but even the legendary Kitsune no Kyuubi wasn't cruel enough to force Naruto into the office. The Sandaime Hokage, however, was the personification of malevolent beings who wished pain upon the innocent populace, because the tip of his cane (which he only used for dramatic effect and the three extra weapons he could hide inside of it) connected with the small of Naruto's back.

Naruto took one step forward, and then a second, and a third, and before his feet could halt themselves, he was onto his sixteenth and then nineteenth, and he still wasn't halfway through the office. He felt at that instance that, if he kept walking for a thousand years, he still wouldn't be halfway through the office.

It had been a house, once. It had suffered through multiple renovations, but it was apparent that once, someone had lived here. There was a well worn, incredibly ugly couch smashed against one wall, it's presence announced by the small incline of height in the level of boxes and the small corner of one arm, clad in neon green and red zigzags with bright yellow dots scattered throughout. There was also a staircase leading up to a second story, but the thick railing and wide spaces between posts proved that it was definitely civilian-made, as shinobi either didn't need staircase, or preferred them when you couldn't stick a broom handle through the slats, prompting a quick fall and a broken neck.

The boxes themselves were higher than Naruto's head. Some were cardboard, and though there were a multitude of shades of brown, most looked old to the point of disintegrating on touch, not to mention a hard breath's away from toppling over in a cascade of towers down the one thin aisle that wasn't completely covered in _something_. The aisle was large enough that Naruto could get through, but Sarutobi was having trouble getting his huge hat between the boxes, and the ANBU were having trouble with their wide shoulders (except, of course, for the female one, whose problem rested with her wide hips).

No one _dared_ to try to jump up onto the boxes, and even the ceiling was off limits as Naruto was the smallest one there (though, the lackey ran a close second) and he wouldn't be able to squeeze between the highest boxes and the ceiling if he were half as high.

The kitchen was directly opposite the front door. Once, it had been the break room for whatever prisoners of war had worked here. There was a large coffee pot that had three layers of dust on it, as opposed to the eighteen present everywhere else visible. It had obviously been well loved to the bitter end. There weren't quite as many boxes in the kitchen as there had been in what was probably the living room, but that wasn't saying much. There was a carved trail which went from the entrance of the room, to the coffee maker, to the refrigerator, which, like the rest of the house, was unpowered.

The dark didn't bother Naruto much, as he'd spent much of his time navigating through the dark during the long, lonely nights at home, the thick forests during mission patrols, and at night in the homes of his precious people to set up his pranks. There had even been occasions where the fox had been gracious enough to grant him something like night vision, and more frequent occasions where the dark didn't even matter when his other senses could help him along anyway. There were no windows in the SAP office, as it _had_ been a shinobi office, and the buildings on either side of the office likely enjoyed their walls. What light was drifting through the office beamed through the dirtied curtain and peeling newspaper thrown against the windows of the front door, and it only barely reached the kitchen.

Naruto glanced at the Hokage, who could apparently see well enough to glance back. The old man had the good grace to look sheepish. "It is rather ..."more" than I expected."

"More what? More of a goddamn catastrophe? What the hell was this place used _for_, anyway?" Naruto could hoist himself onto the counter in between what seemed like a stack of newspapers from the Mist Country and a metal device which either was used in hair dressing or in the interrogation unit and did so, envoking a jealous glare from the minion, what could be a longing stare from one of the ANBU, and a sigh from the Hokage.

"This is known by those with either occupational clearance or an unfortunate history of it as the SAP office. "Shinobi Archival Project"."

Naruto raised his eyebrow. "Isn't having a lot of information about shinobi hanging around a really bad idea? I mean, I don't care how good your ANBU are - human screw ups _happen_, and having a lot of information around for them to get seems...well, damn stupid."

The Sandaime inclined his head. "That was the viewpoint of many involved in the early stages of this site's creation. I, however, mustered enough support to maintain the site for a good number of years. Concerning enemy infiltration? That was one of the key questions which completely redesigned the clearance system currently used in the Central Tower."

Naruto snorted. "Yeah, that works real well. Just why the hell do you have key cards there, anyway? It's not like anyone uses them."

The Hokage raised one finger with what was obviously a superior smirk. "Ah. But, that's not the security measure I spoke of in the first place." The old man crept ever closer. He'd had to take off his hat (reluctantly), and it dangled from a thin tie around his neck down his back. Without the traditional cap, Naruto could see the old man's receding hairline, liver spots, and hard-earned wrinkles, frown lines, crows feet, and the occasional laugh line. For a moment, he tried to memorize not just Sarutobi's face, but his wrinkles, and the pull of his cheeks, and the sag of his ears. He compared that to the image he knew of Makoto (though, he admitted, it was somewhat idealized by now), and decided that even if he knew a hundred old people, he'd never be able to tell the differences in ages between them. The only sure sign he had that Makoto was younger than Sarutobi was the way that the older man's hands would shake and cramp up on cold days, and how he secretly had a blanket which warmed when infused with chakra that he hid under his robes in winter.

Silently, the Hokage took one of Naruto's fingers and outstretched an empty palm for only a moment before one of the ANBU quickly placed what looked like a senbon on it. "If I may, Naruto?" The blond couldn't help but nod. He didn't know where this was going, but he already had the feeling that he wouldn't like it. Naruto watched Sarutobi's eyes for a moment, and there was a smirk on the old man's face, before it quickly shifted into a look of horror. "My word! What in the name of the Fire Lord was that?" The old man whipped his head to the right, and just as Naruto's gaze connected with what was a plain wall of boxes, he felt a sharp prick on the edge of his finger.

He turned his head back to the malevolent old fiend to find him passing the senbon (could he really have put that much blood on it in such a short time?) back to an ANBU, who bowed and sprinted to the exit, throwing open the door and letting just enough light back into the office for Naruto to see the fact that the ceiling would likely be about five inches higher if someone removed the canopy of spiderwebs from it. That "someone", of course, would inevitably be him.

"So," Naruto grumbled, sucking on his finger for a moment before he felt it heal, "what mission rank is this again? C?"

Sarutobi scratched the back of his head. "Security clearance B, actually. Originally, there were planned to be dozens of offices like this around Konoha, and the "security measures" I've spoken of were going to allow an unprecedented level of organization in each one. There was talk about each building have a specialization - bloodlines, mission classifications, etc. - (Naruto had to search his brain for a moment, as he'd never heard _anyone_ say "etcetera" out loud before), but that was ultimately discarded at about the same time as the project. All the paperwork, however, was still gathered for dozens of buildings, and not the half-dozen that were actually constructed by that time."

"You mean," Naruto paced carefully, wiping off a layer of dust from the sink only to find more dust underneath it, "that there are _more_ places like this?"

The bow of Sarutobi's head could almost be seen as apologetic. "Six, in total. When I say that this is a mission few in Konoha have attempted, I truly meant it. I believe that the trail you saw carved through the living area was the result of dozens of individual attempts over the last decade and so."

"Decade and..." Naruto trailed off. "This project got canned because of the Kyuubi, didn't it?"

"At the time," Sarutobi motioned with his hands, "the reconstruction of the civilian and business districts was of a much higher priority than new government offices, and when enough funds had been pooled to finally restart, my support had wavered."

It might've been that the room suddenly changed. Naruto started noticing the small things about the office - the light blue paint, the small shred of brown shag carpeting caught between the newspaper coating the kitchen floor and a row of boxes, the plywood board that covered what could actually have been a _window_ to the outside world - and suddenly, the mission didn't seem hard at all. It might've been the fact that Makoto had been right, which was in itself starting to seem like a trend. She believed that, no matter what problem you had, someone else out there had it worse. Some how, it almost seemed like a selfish point of view to have. It was almost like you were _hoping _someone else out there had it worse, just so you would feel better. Frankly, it almost appealed to the kyuubi-vessel.

While Naruto didn't know exactly how hard the lives of the other Demon-vessels had been, he was willing to bet that at least _one _of them had a crappier childhood than he had. The same, of course, applied for Konoha. The SAP office was, judging by the fact that the number of attempts by talented, ambitious clerical-shinobi completely equaled the number of _failures_, one of the worst organizational disasters in Konoha. The worst _disaster_ in Konoha, however, was certainly the Kyuubi (though, he was sure that he and Sakura would both submit votes for Kakashi's field cooking).

Sarutobi had told him the day before that he was equipped to do this job like no one else in Konoha. While Naruto wasn't _certain_ that he'd known about the whole Kage Bunshin cheat, the old man was probably smart enough to figure it out on his own. There was a chance, however, that that wasn't what the Sandaime was referring to.

There seemed to be a certain kind of justice in the mission, and it made Naruto feel strangely in the pit of his stomach. Konoha had certainly been screwed to pieces by the Kyuubi. It took careful planning, excellent leadership, and the cooperation of all of the citizens and shinobi to restore the Village to it's former glory. Naruto, while the silence stretched on, realized that he wished he could have been there too.

Makoto seemed to have an endless supply of lessons. How to either have manners or pretend like one did, how to clean and not burn holes through counters, the best ways to make impromptu weapons in innocuous settings, how to make seams blend together when mending, how to comb hair and not draw blood, and how to deal with life when it all goes wrong seemed to only be the tip of the iceberg, and Naruto had the feeling that no matter if she lived for a thousand years, she would always have fifteen stories to tell when the time was right. Somehow, she seemed to know what to say and somehow, it always seemed to be just what Naruto needed to hear.

She called it "Karma". For Naruto, it was _terrifying_.

If all the bad things someone did came back one day, did that include his past of boredom and anxiety-fueled pranks? Did whatever dealing out the huge Karma tokens count the Kyuubi as a part of him, or was the fox officially out of the game when it came to that? Naruto believed that he wasn't a bad person. He had killed before, but that didn't seem like it was such a big deal, not when he was a shinobi and it was his mission. He'd lied before, but the same principle applied, and when they were little white lies to academy teachers, it couldn't possibly count. He'd stolen before, but he'd been small and clumsy and starving, and later when he'd actually had money, he _did_ leave some at that stand. (Not, of course, Ichiraku's, as he'd rather chop off his own arm and sell it for food than steal some from them).

When he committed "bad" acts, he'd always had his reasons, and he always made it up to whoever he wrong afterwards. The Old Man actually taught him the same thing years ago (though, it hadn't had "karma" as a name, and really didn't need a name at all). If he punched a hole in a wall, he'd have to fix the wall afterwards. Cause and effect. Crime, and punishment.

The Kyuubi destroyed Konoha. Not completely, but it destroyed families and sectors and histories and, worst of all, _lives._ People who grew up without parents, people who left Konoha because everything they had there was gone, people whose entire livelihoods were slash in half as it was damn hard to be a ninja with one foot or three fingers.

It was only fair that if the Kyuubi helped to destroy Konoha, he would help _fix _it, too. And, if it meant that it would be Naruto's hands that had to get filthy with plaster, so be it.

It was a strange notion, and Naruto must've made a small noise of wonder, because Sarutobi turned to him and finally broke the silence. "If I could ask what has you so deeply enthralled in thought? It happens so rarely that it's piqued my curiosity."

Naruto scowled, and Sarutobi chuckled. All at once, everything was familiar between them again, and Naruto wondered what happened to the dread he was feeling all through the night before and into the morning (which, honestly, didn't end until he was interrupted) because, looking at the mounds of boxes, the newspaper littering the floor (it was more of a civilian newsletter, but some shinobi bought it to clip out coupons or look for yard sales), and the foot-thick spiderwebs with corresponding foot-wide spiders, Naruto felt a surge of confidence that seemed to have nothing to do with his actual ability to do it and actually stemmed from a sort of precognition.

He could do SAP - he could do it easily. BIRCH took him less than an hour and back then, (as two days prior was officially an eternity before), he hadn't had a clue how to organize anything. Now, he and his clones had better experience at looking for specific items (who knew a library could come in handy?), organizing the unorganizable, and peeking at information in the process. Plus, as a bonus, he'd figured out a way to keep his brain from exploding while doing so, which, in his book, was always a plus.

He smirked. "I was just thinking about how awesome I'm going to look when I'm Hokage. But, you know," he added conversationally, "you make those robes look stupid - okay, "stupider" - when you're all covered in grey. The dust nearly matches what hair hasn't fallen off of your head and migrated to your nose, you old coot."

While the toady little henchman Naruto had forgotten was still lurking around gasped and sputtered, one of the ANBU shook almost as if he was laughing. Naruto had seen Bear before, as he was often one of Sarutobi's personal guards, and the tall ANBU (though, of course, _all_ ANBU were tall. They probably used stilts.) seemed more at ease around him than most of the other high ranking ninja. It probably had something to do with the fact that he _had_ been guarding Sarutobi for long enough that he'd already seen all the stupid things that Naruto had done over the years and figured a kid whose made that many mistakes couldn't be much of a threat.

The Hokage laughed and brushed a thick layer of soot-like dust off. It clung to the white cloth like ash with a bad temper and a grudge (though, that could be summarized as "like an Uchiha"), and Naruto smirked as he rubbed one hand on his chest, where his white sweatshirt _still_ was both white _and_ a sweatshirt. The last one was a bit of a given, but the first qualified for shock and awe, considering the circumstances. In reality, it was _another_ act of family - this time from Haruka.

While Naruto still hadn't learned exactly where she'd begun working, when she was doing the morning shopping for her mother, she found a bottle of miracle liquid. Apparently, it was a stain repellent graded so high that it worked for _shinobi_. Of course, Naruto hadn't heard about it before, but he decided that he didn't mind much as, three days previous, he didn't mind about stains, either.

"I'm sure you'll commission a set in orange and blue, when the day comes, Naruto." The Hokage raised on one eyebrow as the toad seemed to whimper. "Ah. You likely hadn't have known about that if I hadn't told you." When he and the old man were in contact on a day to day basis, Sarutobi managed to read his mind at least three times a day. The old man shook his wizened old head. "Yes, the Hokage's robes have undergone changes since they were first designed by the Shodaime's wife. Why, the Yondaime sewed his own little touches into his."

Naruto felt a small smile creep on his face. He knew exactly how his father learned how to sew, and the idea of one of Konoha's greatest ninja sitting on a floor somewhere, needle in his mouth and fingers pricked ten times over seemed somehow _warm_. "Yeah," he began, the grin refusing to budge off, "orange and blue spirals at the edge of it, right? With a white background. Well, maybe I'll go with red or something. But, definitely the spirals." The Hokage raised an eyebrow. "What? Hey, it's not like I'll need camouflage at that point. I'll be the _Hokage_. Strongest ninja in the village, you know?"

"I see." Sarutobi chuckled, shaking his head softly. "But, before you become Hokage, you need to complete your missions."

"Right!" Naruto glanced around. The kitchen had a little bit more walking space than the rest of the house (as far as he could tell). He gestured towards the ANBU and the old man, who raised their eyebrows (Naruto was starting to sense _that_ behind masks, too), but stayed put.

Naruto slowly paced the aisle. He noted how there were some columns of boxes which seemed less sturdy than others, while other rows seemed ready to topple all the ones around it down. He tapped a few of the boxes, coughing at the clouds of dust. One box was so completely covered in cobwebs that the knock was completely _muffled_. Glancing back, he saw just enough space in front of him and in back of him to inspire him.

Quickly and quietly, he focused his energy, sending out small tendrils exploring and grasping throughout the room and then, when they couldn't find anything familiar to them, outside the house and beyond. There were only a few stray Kage Bunshin still lounging on the rooftops. Naruto couldn't precisely read their thoughts, but he could usually tell if they were doing something strenuous, like battling or trying to read a very difficult book. Three were idle, one was sleeping, and just two or three were out about town. Thinking for a moment, Naruto dispelled the four lazy clones, but left the other two alone. If his clones wanted a little break from work, Naruto decided that they'd earned it over the last couple of days. If he couldn't laze around or sleep, though, _none of him_ would be.

Naruto wouldn't call it a "trance", but he found that thinking about his clones like this required a certain state of mind. When they'd tried to teach meditation in the Academy, he'd called it "nap time", and he still couldn't tell the difference between the two. However, there was a difference between how he thought about his other techniques and how he thought about the Kage Bunshin and mainly, the key divergence was memory.

Naruto carefully sifted through disused corners of his brain, picking out his visions of BIRCH, his times at the library, and the many battles before with a nameless, bossy clone who always jumped to the heart of the battle right beside Naruto. Names were just as new as the personalities were, but somehow, Foreman had been there from the start. Naruto didn't know exactly _when_ or, frankly, _how_ clones started becoming something more than just copies of him. Foreman was the first, Glasses was another, and the honest truth was that Cheery might've been used before and more often than Glasses. Somehow, battling always seemed to cheer him up, as beating the crap out of something was bound to put a smile on pretty much anyone's face.

Naruto had performed Kage Bunshin dozens, perhaps hundreds of times since the night he'd first read the forbidden scroll. Recent days, however, had prompted some changes. The library taught him about how things could be so much less painful if he just monitored how much energy he put into things. He'd already decided that he had crappy chakra control, but hoped it wouldn't matter in the end because Kage Bunshin required tons of chakra to create and maintain, so even if he "spilled" a little when he was forming them, he had butt loads to back it up with. If he either got skilled or got lucky (with the latter being more likely), he could possibly eliminate info overflow completely. As it was, Naruto bit his lip briefly, concentrated on bossy, charismatic, sensible Foreman, and pushed thick ropes of chakra into his memories.

Even though he didn't need to, he opened his eyes and saw Foreman staring not at him, but at the surroundings in wonder. "Geeeez." Foreman's eyes were wide, and he whistled. "Glasses wasn't kidding about us being used today. Hell."

"Yeah, I know." Naruto shrugged his shoulders. "Sucks big time. But, well, look at the space we got. Any suggestions on how to do this? I'd like to just create a hundred, but I don't think we'd all have room to move around and all."

Foreman nodded. "Yeah, that'd be the problem." The clone shifted in front of Naruto, and they came stomach to stomach as they passed in the thin aisle. Naruto was quite glad he'd put a "metric butt load" of chakra into Foreman, as otherwise Foreman would've poofed on the physical contact. Other than being a time waste, it wasn't much more than an annoyance. But, with all the energy in him at the moment, Foreman, Naruto estimated, should be able to withstand a good amount of brushes, as long as no one was an idiot about it.

Foreman paced down the aisles, knocked on a few of the boxes, and went all the way to the door and peeled back one sheet of the newspaper. Naruto, over Foreman's shoulder, spotted a small group of his fans clustered near one of the alleyways on the other side of the street, still glancing around.

With a satisfied nod, the clone turned back to face Naruto. "If we do this carefully, I think we can get a good dozen clones here to start with. We can form them down this aisle and have a chain started. There's space enough for about two or three clones and a few boxes in this entryway. We can start pulling trash and boxes out at both ends, and eventually we'll be able to speed up the progress after we have more room. You just want one of us where people can see, right?" At Naruto's nod, the clone rubbed his chin. "Ask the Hokage if this place has electric at all, or if all the lights are just burned out. It might be a problem when it gets darker." Naruto raised an eyebrow. "I said it "might"!".

"Yeah, you're right. Twelve, you said? Okay. I'm going to use you as a focus quick." Naruto took another look at the aisle and saw the Hokage peering at him incredulously. Naruto signaled him to step back with a shooing hand gesture before closing his eyes again and concentrating first on Foreman, and then on the memories of the clones he wanted to create. Glasses and Cheery were first on his list, and came rather easily. He concentrated extra hard on Glasses, and drew upon the treacherous memories of the previous day's unknown experience to put an actual pair of spectacles on the clone. He made them as thick and boxy as he could possibly manage in a weak, yet satisfying, sort of revenge.

The rest of the unnamed ones came automatically. Naruto didn't feel like experimenting with putting them all in white or all in orange, and instead just grabbed wide ropes of chakra and slid them into his clones unevenly. With all the paperwork he'd be doing, Naruto _definitely_ wanted his clones to poof out gradually, and not all at once. Otherwise, all the information he'd read would get scrambled in the saturation (not to mention the fact that his head would explode into a dozen oozing chunks), and Naruto had a goal in mind.

Even if Kakashi-sensei was the student of the Yondaime, the jonin still probably wouldn't tell Naruto more than jack about him. Even though he'd used his "favors" from Sasuke and Sakura on Rin and Obito when, in a horrible twist of irony, a first person source was right beside him, he still knew that he'd be better off scouting for more facts on his own than hoping they'd actually do research.

"Troops!" Naruto barked, watching the twelve clones straighten from complete ease into something that mocked a ready stance. Most of them smirked. Some of them snarled. Cheery, at the end, waved merrily at the Bear ANBU who, like Sarutobi and the other special jonin, were watching wide eyed. "Right. Same procedure as the last two jobs. Let's try to get as much room in here as possible so we can get as many of us in here as possible. We'll figure out trash as we go, but for now, ditch anything so moldy or censored you can't tell anything from it. Who wants to run errands outside?"

A few clones waved their hands, and Naruto glanced at Foreman. "Second from the right was lazy yesterday, and the one next to Cheery kept hiding pieces of trash under bushes so he wouldn't have to bag them." Foreman leaned over and squinted. "I'd go with the guy on the right of Glasses. He helped with the pond yesterday."

Naruto nodded briskly, and jerked his thumb towards that clone and back. "Right! We'll need bags, boxes, tape, bug spray, and..." Naruto trailed off, smacking one fist on an open palm. "Oh yeah! Hey, Old man? Does this place have electricity or what?"

The Hokage blinked once, then twice, and then glanced towards one of the ANBU, who could've shrugged. "I see no reason why it shouldn't. I don't believe anyone in recent years has gotten far enough into this Office to find any lights to turn on, however."

Naruto nodded again. "We'll cross that bridge as necessary. Light bulbs, too." Naruto glanced at his clones, and then at Foreman. "Eh, what the hell. Get form TRn-76 from BIRCH - we can mark down those as mission expenses we can get reimbursed for, and if you grab TRn-79, we can get munchies while we're at it. If you want help, I can make you another clone, but grab some drinks and a couple of snacks for the hard workers." The blond heard the sound of someone choking to death, and glanced at the toady little lackey, who looked to be in the midst of a seizure.

Foreman waved Naruto's attention to him. "Hey, that reminds me! Yesterday, the guy who did the most work in the park - you said something about giving him free ramen?"

"Dammit." Naruto frowned. "I did, didn't I? Well, hell - can't go back on that. Okay, how am I going to remember which bastard that was?"

Foreman waved easily. "Let me handle it next wave we do, alright?"

Apparently, the Hokage couldn't take it any longer, because he cleared his throat loudly enough that five frogs lodged in it were hurled against the wall, impaling themselves halfway through the brick siding outside. "Naruto. This..." for a moment, Sarutobi was speechless, then sighed and rolled his fingers for a moment before coming to a word "assembly is ...common for you?"

Naruto recalled the notebook carefully misplaced within the bag at his side, filled with the same questions - though, at a lower level, using smaller words, and in lesser quantity - that he was sure the Hokage had bursting inside of his skull. The blond nodded. "Well, the past couple of days have seen it more than ever. Foreman here's pretty new - at least, the name is. He helps me organize 'em all, though I guess I could keep track of 'em all myself if I really, really needed to. It's much easier with him, though, 'cause he's damn good at it."

"Glasses there," Naruto pointed towards the center where the clone adjusted the arm of his glasses with an content expression, "is a gigantic bastard. Everyone points at him and laughs behind his back." The content expression vanished as Glasses narrowed his eyes, an act which did look more threatening behind glasses than Naruto originally thought. The original paused and shrugged. "And, well, he also helps a lot with intellectual crap. He'll know pretty much where to sort things, how, and when we all screw up. He just _loves_ telling us when we screw up."

Glasses smirked, using his new spectacles to cover his eyes dramatically. Naruto rolled his own, and Foreman spared a sympathetic glance.

"Heeeeey! Boss! Boss, over here!" Despite the fact that Cheery was the furthest away from Naruto, the Original had no trouble spotting Cheery, who was wearing Naruto's old jumpsuit and bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet, waving wildly with his hands. "What about me, huh? Why'd you make me here? It's 'cause I'm so cool and stuff, right? Right?"

There was a pause, and Naruto slowly turned his head to Foreman. The orange suited clone scratched the back of his head, and several of the unnamed clones in line glanced at each other. There were mutterings which sounded like "Beats me", "Can't help you there", and "Wait, why _did_ you create a klutz in the middle of a minefield, boss?".

"Weeeell..." Naruto began, glancing desperately at the walls, the boxes, the ceiling, and the rather lazy looking spiders nesting above them all. "For...moral support?"

"Yeah!" Cheery danced in his spot, elbows managing to hit the clone next to him five times in every rotation and booty shake. If Naruto had been standing three hundred yards away, he _still_ could've seen the widening of Sarutobi's eyes.

"Naruto," the old man breathed, "How is it that your clones can withstand multiple physical blows? The Kage Bunshin technique is itself forbidden, but this is...unthinkable."

"Wish I knew myself." Foreman nodded along with him, and Naruto was forced to shrug. "Kinda a recent discovery, really. I can funnel chakra into myself - I mean, my clones - and that keeps 'em sturdier. Kinda like putting a book under a three legged table. As long as they don't do anything stupid, most of them don't explode until they run out of energy." He paused. "I haven't really tested to see how many hits I - well, "we" - could take in battle yet, though. Like I said, it _is_ kind of new."

Sarutobi carefully approached Cheery, who realized the Sandaime was there when the old man extended one finger slowly and doinked the clone in the middle of the forehead. Cheery reluctantly froze in the middle of a booty shake, opening wide blue eyes to glance up. "What's up, gramps?"

Cheery _almost_ frowned when Sarutobi poked him again, but grinned instead, and poked the Sandaime back. "Auuuugh! My finger! Argh, your skull is sucking my finger in! Aaaaah!" Sarutobi crossed his eyes up at precisely the same time that ten Narutos rolled theirs. "Ha. Gotcha. See, my finger was folded up here the whole time! I completely fooled you, right? Right?"

Naruto sighed. "So, Old Man. What time limit am I working here? You called this a long term mission before – just how long term? When am I getting paid for this? I have twelve mouths to feed, you know, and that's just who are here right now."

Sandaime carefully stepped back from Cheery with a small expression of shock that made him back into a row of boxes. One clone dashed over and used the tips of his fingers while on the tips of his toes to prop the box back upright. "Incredible. Simply incredible."

Naruto, of course, would accept praise from anyone any time it was given. There was something worrying about just how Sarutobi was glancing at him, though. It was just like how the old coot looked when he was bent over incredibly complicated quantum-chakra puzzles – the sort Naruto usually used as coloring pages and folded into paper airplanes covered in insults at the ANBU on nearby rooftops. It made him feel like he was being scanned inside out – like Sarutobi was secretly the weirdest looking Hyuuga ever, and he was completely being dissected, with all his body parts spread out and labeled.

"As I said before," Sarutobi finally spoke, to no small relief on Naruto's part, "there are six offices. As even this building has multiple floors (I'm afraid I'm not sure how many are dedicated to storage. Frankly, no one can remember.), there is indeed quite a good amount of work involved. The fact that so many shinobi with higher qualifications have tried and, quite frankly, failed to achieve what you've done even at the BIRCH office, it does upgrade the mission's difficulty a few degrees. For a shinobi of chuunin rank, as a single mission, this would be considered an active mission for however long as was needed. Given the fact that you are a genin and have no _official_ qualifications to, quite frankly, be here in the first place, the expected duration would be well past..."

"When all my hair falls out, I have nineteen kids, and I get as old and gray as you?" The lackey choked in horror, and two of the ANBU glanced at each other. For all he knew, they were some of the ones who had watched him as a child, and knew the unspeakable horror that would possibly be unleashed if all of his children were like him.

Sarutobi snorted. "Close, actually. Now, how much time do you think _you'll_ need for this?"

Naruto glanced at Foreman again, who was glancing at the ceiling with an appraising eye. "Eh. Tell you what. Keep track of the time for me. Tell me when I have to leave for the whole "Kakashi" thing, and we'll see how far I get with this by then."

The Sandaime nodded, and then glanced at the stout office worker. "I appreciate your time, and want to commend you on seeking to personally assure the security of your Office. However, Kaede-san, I believe that we have both seen that this building could be in worse hands."

Naruto puffed up his chest for a moment while Glasses shook his head. "That was an insult, "Boss"." The named clone crossed one arm across his chest while the other pressed to the bridge of his nose.

The kyuubi-vessel quickly shook his expression free, growled at Glasses, and turned to glare at Sarutobi, who was watching their interaction with calculating interest on his face.

"Let me guess, Old Man – you have questions about my whole weirdo clone thing, right?" Sarutobi raised an eyebrow. "I'll take that as a big old "Yes". Well, here's the deal – I'll answer any question of yours as best as I can (which, well, might not be all that good with most of these), and you have to answer just one question for me."

Sarutobi snorted. "Let's assume there are normal limits about confidentiality about this? As in, you can't ask about things that are above your security clearance?"

"Hey!" Naruto interjected. "I thought you said that you were raising it for this mission. I mean, I _am_ ear-deep in shinobi documentation. I'm pretty sure that, no matter what I ask you and no matter what you won't tell me, I'll step in worse while cleaning."

"Aah. You do remember that. You seemed rather distracted last night." The Sandaime nodded. "However, any conversation between us regarding your clones doesn't directly relate to your mission at hand, and security would be-"

"Yeah, I get it, I get it." Naruto crossed his arms in front of him firmly and raised his chin so high that he could barely see boxes over his nose and the horizon of his cheeks. "So, deal?"

Sarutobi smirked. "To the best of our abilities, then." He extended one wizened hand while Naruto slapped it with his own, and the lackey seemed to be tearing out hunks of his own hair, weeping pathetically. One of the ANBU nudged him with a foot, and Sarutobi spared an eye in his direction. "And, of course, I'll appreciate your discretion about this whole matter, Kaede-san."

Naruto took a moment to scan the insides of his mind. Last night, he'd learned first off the shame and humiliation involved with wasting a favor on something you'd find out quickly after, and during last night's meeting with the Hokage, the old coot had spoken about the Kyuubi and the mission being related. It would be a shame to waste any questions (or, rarer still) answers he got out of the geezer, so the Kyuubi was an out topic. His father was a touchy subject too, as while Sarutobi knew about that, he didn't know that Naruto knew, and knew nothing about Makoto and Haruka. He hadn't spoken with his relatives about revealing themselves publicly yet, as that would carry with it tons of problems he wasn't quite ready to address.

Glasses coughed off to one side, but Naruto kept scraping at the insides of his skull. There was the whole issue about Chakra control, but that was something he'd probably have to train himself to. He could, of course, ask about training methods, and put that in queue. Finally, his mental fingers (which rather resembled sausages, and were just as graceful) brushed upon an unanswered question that, revealed to the light, irked him.

"Okay. I have a question for you. Yesterday, I was talking with Kakashi-sensei and, well, I'm not really going to give you a context for this, but what the hell do katanas and sheathes have to do with hookers?" He paused. "And, there's another thing. What's the deal with pregnant people? I mean, babies _do_ just appear, right?"

Sarutobi halted mid-step, one foot inches off the ground, hands at his side. The position was so ludicrous that it appeared the old man would fall in a heap at any moment. Instead, the Hokage slowly rotated his head to Naruto with eyes that shone with the exact same shade of horror that had tinted Makoto's. "You were talking about hookers with your sensei?"

Naruto nodded vigorously. "Sasuke was there, too. I'm pretty sure he already knows about them, though. I mean, I think Kakashi was trying to be subtle about it, but Sasuke knew what he was talking about right off the bat."

One of the ANBU - Bear, possibly - made a sharp choking noise. Behind the Boar mask, the female ANBU seemed to be backing away. His clones glanced at each other, then at the Sandaime, whose normally coffee-colored skin was losing color so rapidly that he almost matched his robes.

"Kaede-san. No, Boar." The Hokage's voice was uneven and cracking with every syllable. "Tell Himura to rally an emergency assembly of the council. I want to break the speed record for the passing of a law."

"The law, Hokage-sama?" Boar's bow was light, little more than an inclination of her head, but her voice was deep and husky. Behind her mask, Naruto was _sure_ that her eyes were darting at him.

"The proclamation that Hatake Kakashi will never be allowed to teach _anyone_ about ..." The Hokage paused, his hands flailing and grasping in front of him while his mouth traced unreadable silent syllables. Finally, he inhaled sharply enough that clouds of dust gravitated towards him, stood up straighter, and finished in one rather high pitched sentence. "About sex or any act or deviation of it unless directly impacting the fate of a mission." He sagged, and glanced to Boar.

"U-understood." Boar couldn't somersault across the clones because of the low ceiling, and for a moment, Naruto thought that the few steps she took backwards were to prepare herself for a running leap over his dozen clones anyway. Instead, she nodded once more to her teammates, and vanished out of the office in a poof of smoke.

The Hokage looked like he desperately wanted to do the same.

Naruto frowned. "Sex? Wait a second - what does that have to do with hookers or pregnant people?"

Sarutobi raised a badly shaking hand to run through (what was left of) his hair. With the other hand, he retrieved his pipe from inside of his robes. It was probably a jutsu (as it was said "The Professor" knew _all_ of them), but the pipe was suddenly lit, smoke rings were blown, and Sarutobi looked much calmer after a number of minutes.

Some of Naruto's clones glanced at each other again, and Naruto tapped his foot. "Well? Are you going to answer me or not? If you're just gonna dawdle, I might as well dispel these clones and go home. You're blocking the aisle, anyway." He paused. "Isn't smoking in a place like this pretty much asking for a huge inferno of death and doom?"

Naruto _swore_ he heard Sarutobi mutter "If only that could take me now". "Before shinobi are released from the academy, Naruto, there's normally a ...seminar they attend. Where were you the week before your graduation?"

It took some more scratching at the infrequently visited halls of his memory, but he finally flaked off a few flashes, visions of actions and plots that stuck out from the rest. "Painting mascara on your face, and planning it for the earlier part of the week. I mean, I was there for some of the classes that week - I think the taijutsu guy wasn't bad, and Iruka always bitches if I miss his. And, then Mizuki-sen..." He stopped mid-syllable, and glanced at Sarutobi. The blond shook his head. "Anyway, I was busy. Why? Did you cover hookers in class?"

The fox heard "God forbid these twelve year olds learn more about hookers." from Sarutobi, who was shaking his head under the context of refilling his pipe. "Naruto, if you didn't attend the academy seminar, where did you learn such ..."accuracy" in your "Sexy No Jutsu" technique?"

Naruto raised his eyebrow. "Well, from your stash of nudie magazines you keep in your desk." Sarutobi froze completely, particles of tobacco drifting themselves onto the floor as his hands stopped mid-dump. "The ones you keep behind that unsigned proposition for building a casino in Konoha?"

Naruto didn't know what animal the third ANBU was supposed to be - it looked somewhat like a badger- but Naruto was completely reminded of Iruka to the point of having to carefully regard and discount the ANBU's height to make sure it wasn't his teacher. The ANBU was several inches too tall, and Naruto wasn't sure that Iruka's hair could even be hid convincingly. Hands on his hips, spine straight and with what was surely righteous indignation on his features under his mask, Badger looked like the very image of the authority figure.

Bear, on the other hand, actually _released_ a snicker, one which was quickly smothered when the Hokage, beet red, turned to frown at him. By the time the Hokage twisted, Bear was ramrod straight, hands clasped behind his back.

Naruto couldn't help but feel a sense of utter confusion wash across him. "I mean, I created Sexy no Jutsu because I always saw how distracted you were when you were reading them - some of my best pranks were only made possible because of that - and it seemed like the perfect distraction technique." He paused again. "What the hell is with all the blood, anyway? You and that other pervert teacher of Konohamaru's bleed all over the damn place whenever I use it."

The Hokage frowned, likely at the indignation of being grouped in with Ebisu, but took a deep breath and hid his blush with one hand that also rubbed at the corners of his eyes.

A few seconds later, the Sandaime's lowered eyes lit with what could be nothing but inspiration. "My boy," he began, and Naruto knew that that was the start of all things bad, "I have a proposition for you. Like the majority of Konohagakure, I am well aware of your deficiencies concerning chakra control."

"Hey! I'm sure it's not _that_ ba..." Naruto trailed off as four pairs of eyes drilled into him incredulously. "Fine. Yeah, it does really suck. But, you don't have to say it out loud, you know?"

Sarutobi continued on. "I know of a rather "specialized" course that teaches fine chakra control. Some of my best ANBU have taken this course, and the wide majority of those who survive it go on to become fine shinobi." There was something unnamed (but most likely evil) in Sarutobi's eyes. It made Naruto shiver. "Not only will it review some basics of shinobi combat - all of which will be old and worn to you, I'm sure - but it will also teach you needed skills required in many stealth infiltration missions. Most importantly," he concluded with narrowed eyes and a smirk, "it will address certain deficiencies in your knowledge."

Naruto crossed his arms. "This is another thing about paperwork, isn't it?"

"Ah, no my boy! I can tell you with complete honesty that there will be a negligible amount of paperwork on your part compared to how much I'm going to have to complete to actually get you into it."

Naruto rubbed his chin. He could admit to himself (rarely, in the dead of night, and when he was alone for fifty miles on all sides) that his basic ninja skills sucked, a fact limited not just to the fact that the teachers at the academy hated him, but also to the point that he wasn't _there_ much of the time. A "review" of things he should've already known would be an improvement, and every improvement bettered his chances of not getting killed in stupid ways and making Makoto cry.

He nodded. "What the hell. It's not like it can hurt, right?"

Glasses looked as innocent as a basket of particularly fluffy kittens (only ones without bows on, which proved that he was up to _something)_. "I'm sure that Sarutobi would never put you into any situation where you'll be," and he laughed here, a wry snort which sounded strange coming out in Naruto's own voice, "unduly humiliated."

Naruto nodded. "Right! The Old Man here knows me too well for that. I mean, hell. The last time I really, really asked to learn something got me here, and ...okay, he was just lazy and wanted me to do paperwork for him. But, the time before that, I really wanted to be put into a team with Sakura...but got Sasuke." He glanced at up the Hokage, who could've been sweat dropping. "Give me a minute. I'm sure I'll find something that proves you're not out to get me."

Glasses shook his head. "Don't injure yourself."

Foreman squeezed past the row of clones until he could see the Hokage clearly. He waved. "Hey, hi. I was just wondering if you wanted us to look for anything special in here. Also, what are we sorting by? Years and categories? Alphabetically? You'll have to have someone here telling us what we can ditch, after we make the initial sweep. You might just want to do it yourself, as you're pretty much cleared for any department's paperwork in here." Sarutobi blinked twice, and Foreman scratched his head. "Eh, someone needs to think about this crap."

Naruto nodded. "Damn glad it's not me. Well, okay, he _is_ me, but it's..." He paused and turned to Glasses. "Can you explain it?"

Glasses clasped his hands together and pressed his thumbs to his lips. "No."

The Hokage almost sounded reluctant as he interrupted them. "Actually, there _is_ something which, if you should happen upon it, would be of great interest to me." Glasses nodded, and Naruto craned his head to show his interest. "A number of months ago, a "certain event" was scheduled to take place in Konoha. Unfortunately, that was canceled due to ...reasons I cannot mention to you at this time. However, paperwork for it should be stored somewhere in Konoha, and as your new categorization made it plain to see that it's not achieved at BIRCH, the next logical places to look would be the SAP offices."

Naruto sucked his lips. "Yeah, I can see that. So, what should I look for?"

The Hokage waved his hand dismissively. "It's a simple acceptance letter from the leader of the Village Hidden in the Sand. It should be a scroll embossed with their symbol, an hourglass, and inside of it, you should see a chakra seal."

Naruto thought for a moment, and Glasses clearly smelled the smoke because he shook his head with a long suffering sigh. "It's a small imprint of a person's chakra onto a physical object. It can't be copied by anyone, even if the paper or the technique can be. Tomoe-sensei at the academy used to catch your forged notes because of it."

Naruto smacked his palm. "Oh! Yeah, I get it! Okay, looking for a scroll." Foreman nodded, and Glasses moved his own pair further up his nose in what could pass for agreement. "Right. The Geezer hasn't specified organization types, so let's just clear out trash until we actually have room to sort. When we do, let's go with department or info types, and then go chronologically." He shrugged. "Or, well, we could just wing it."

A dozen clones (as Foreman and Glasses were nodding along with Cheery's enthusiastic head bangs) chorused "Sounds good!", "Why not?", and "Hey, when can we get those munchies you were talking about?".

Naruto could see Sarutobi glance once more down the aisle at the white _and_ orange Naruto clones. The old man was apparently still trying (and failing) to figure out what was going on, and the ANBU in the background were actually craning their necks behind boxes to get a view of their own.

Glasses reached across a few copies (who grumbled but scrunched enough not to get poofed out) to dig into the Original's bag, where he pulled a certain green-covered book out. Naruto didn't mind as, aside from the fact that he'd already inadvertently read it, it could help keep Glasses from lurking over his shoulder and insulting him every available chance.

It made Naruto wonder if he really _did_ have some sort of telepathic communications with his clones, because Glasses took that moment to peer away from the cover to catch Naruto's eyes, a smirk creeping on his features. Naruto turned sharply as Foreman tapped him on his shoulder.

"Boss," the clone started, "After the Old Man, that toad, and the Creepy Mask Guys leave, we can fit another five in, even with the extra room we'll need to start opening boxes and bagging their contents."

"Oh," Sarutobi began with a chuckle. "I'm not leaving. Remember, I still have questions to ask. I believe Bear and Badger are assured of my safety enough to leave." The ANBU seemed to peer at him significantly, and his shoulders sank. "By "leave", I mean of course "lurk on the rooftop and nearby window ledges."

Badger tersely nodded, and the Hokage seemed to glance at Naruto. Part of him classified it as a plea for help. The other part of Naruto classified it as torture that the Old man deserved.

"Ah, Kaede-san then. Badger, if you would escort him out?" The Sandaime glanced at Badger, who glanced at him with (what Naruto could determine as) a raised eyebrow. The look quite clearly asked "How?" Sarutobi took a second look at the six foot high box banks on either side of a thin aisle currently populated by a massive, writhing, singular entity of white, orange, and yellow.

"Oh," he waved with a dismissive hand, "I'm sure you'll find a way."

* * *

This is the chapter that _would not end._ Just like the early chapters, I definitely need your help on this one because I completely feel that it's either overloaded or missing something. There was so much character development in it that I felt like I needed to have a few humor scenes in here to balance them out. They only took about _twenty pages_ for those to show up to my satisfaction. Also, I can't _believe_ that I managed to break my WC record from chapter 10. This is horrifying. 

Anyway, one reason I'm so late on posting this is because it was a huge honking chapter. The real reason I'm so tardy is that I got a Wii, and it's waaaay too much fun. The first thing I did was create Miis for Lee and Gaara. Lee's is so incredibly easy to create that it was specifically meant to be.

But! I really want to thank everyone for their input. I'm glad people are paying enough attention to my stupid grammar mistakes to point them out to me. I know I'm so oblivious to them that I'd completely miss over them despite ten read throughs. I have the usual concerns about OOC behavior, outrageous OCs, and canon. I think I managed to explain a little bit of the story's alternative timeline so far.

Also, I posted a modified warning in the summary of the fic, the first chapter, and last chapter. This fic is officially NOT 367 COMPLIANT. I think Minato is a really dorky name, as shown in one of the scenes I added in here.

OH! I rewrote Chapter 1. Some scenes and lines are the same, but I pretty much doubled the size of the chapter, and I think it flows better. Tell me how you like it!

Thanks again for all the major ego boosts, suggestions, comments, and helpful hints. You guys are awesome.

Enjoy!

PS: You were _all_ completely right about the fangirls, BIRCH, and the SAP offices. It's hard to write something like this when you've all already figured it out, you know?

IEatChicken: How she manages to peel out this much writing so fast is something I'm deeply envious of and can't hope to accomplish. Nevertheless, if you don't review and send her cupcakes and little paper hearts and praise and cookies and plushies… I'll send my purple, man-eating, copyrighted Bubblicious weasels after you. Have a nice day!


	13. The Fruits of Hard Work

Chapter 13

"Alright," Naruto began, twisting the paper in his hands another sixty degrees while his head turned the other way. "Anyone got records of Suou Soun? This is First's era..." he stopped, squinted, and snorted. "Maybe a bit before the First's era. Okay, who has the Old-old paperwork?"

There was the sound of at least a dozen hands flipping through boxes, discarding papers in tight wads, and brushing over paper, parchment, and actual _stone tablets_ as Naruto's clones processed his request. A clone at the end raised his voice. "Yo! Right here!" After a quick wave, Naruto nodded, and the clone picked the second box in his stack, carefully pulling it out and steadying the one above it with a forearm while his leg kept the one below from spilling imminent doom on the surrounding area. Removing the lid, he waved Naruto's attention back. "Got some old blueprints, a few attendance forms from town meetings, and a couple take out menus here."

Naruto shrugged. This, of course, made the clones on either side of him use long-forgotten lightning-quick taijutsu reflexes not to get a rather bony elbow to the face, as they were squashed shoulder to shoulder. Some were sitting on the floor (Naruto decided that Glasses just did it to be a prick), some were standing on the shoulders of others, and some were stuck so far into boxes that their torsos hadn't been seen in hours. Naruto scanned the form once again, noting the faded imprints left in the paper where the ink had actually worn off over time. There wasn't an actual imprinted seal, which was his first sign, and he ran his fingers over the far corner of the paper, then turned his head around. "Dammit, Old Man. If you know these old guys, why won't you say as much?"

Sarutobi lifted a faded lid from yet another box, standing up quickly as the cloud of dust consumed the entire area like a sandstorm. He coughed, waving one hand in front of him as he hacked. Naruto was sure that three fourths of the cough was related to the tobacco in Sarutobi's pipe. An additional eighth of that had to be related to the cigars that the Hokage and his son puffed together as "Father-son" bonding time.

The Hokage had taken off his robe shortly after a clone who acted suspiciously like Cheery tripped over the long (formerly) white hem for the fifth time. Naruto had actually forgotten that, yes, the Hokage actually _did_ wear a jonin style vest under his robes, though that too was quickly discarded after the breath of a dozen people (who, the old ninja couldn't help but point out, _shouldn't be breathing_) turned the dark, damp, dreary office into a sauna. What Naruto _hoped _to forget was the fact that after the Hokage's under-armor got too hot, the old man took that off too.

Naruto _had_ thought that he'd have nightmares about Sakura's face when he'd threatened her chocolate cake, or a relapse of those nightmares involving "the incident" with Sasuke, a horrible vision which would probably be more complex even after the horrible tortures of the previous day (which proved, once and for all, that he had the uncanny ability to seamlessly teleport between the normal realm and universe where everything and everyone wanted him completely humiliated). Instead, he knew he'd have nightmares for at least rest of the week (and more likely, the rest of the month), about Sarutobi's naked chest, glistening in a thin layer of sweat which perfectly highlighted the thatches of gray hair that clumped together, all over lightly darkened skin that sagged in ways that basset hounds wouldn't be able to copy. What was worse than the fact that Naruto knew that stabbing out his eyes with a fork wouldn't remove the image was the fact that he knew this because several of his clones saw the same thing and poofed themselves out the same way, making damn sure that he'd never, ever be able to forget it.

Naruto shuddered, and Sarutobi only pretended not to see it. "I don't know what you mean." The old man wondered. By this point, Naruto knew better. "Why, I've never heard of-"

The blond frowned. "He was your taijutsu instructor back before fire was invented." At Sarutobi's inquisitive glance, Naruto held the paper up to the light again. "Back when you were nine, apparently." Naruto bent his head over the paper again before Sarutobi's nimble hands could snatch it. "He says you sucked."

Naruto paused for a moment, before he and the clone next to him snorted. A few down the line smirked, and Naruto blew a final layer of dust off the parchment before passing the paper down the line. "Put this into pre-academy. It's just a letter bitching about how Sarutobi's "clumsiness" keeps making him trip into this Suou guy's wife." He stopped for another moment. "Apparently, making him trip into her chest even though he barely reached her waist."

Sarutobi tilted his head, one finger cradling his chin before his eyes widened. "Oh! Kimiko-chan." He smiled. "Oh yes."

Naruto raised any eyebrow. "You know, that's a huge hunk of "creepy", right?"

Sarutobi laughed while he scratched the side of his face near one eye. "If you saw Suou Kimiko, you would understand."

"Kinda doubt that, you creepy pervert." Sarutobi jerked his head up sharply, and Naruto gasped, one hand covering his heart dramatically. "Geez. Which one of you guys slandered the Hokage?"

Four clones waved their hands wildly, Glasses adjusted his frames with a smirk, and Cheery waved his arms frantically. The Sandaime sighed. "I believe he meant the previous comment."

"Ah. Gotcha. In that case, it was all him." The unnamed, traitorous clone was four men thick into the line, and Naruto briefly contemplated wading through all of them. Instead, he signaled the clones attention to him. "Ah, hell. Gonna get poofed, right?"

Naruto nodded. "Yep."

The clone sighed, his shoulders heaving as he set down the papers he'd been working on with a hung head. With that, Naruto passed the paper to the nearest clone, who then passed it down the line himself, and closed his eyes, feet spreading easily into the ready stance as he formed the symbols for the jutsu just as a focus. Foreman was at the end nearest the door, carefully monitoring the coming and goings of the clones on the outside, while at the same time double checking bags of trash and occasionally pulling out crumbled balls of old historical peace treaties or half-moldy technique sheets that still showed the first few steps. Naruto didn't want to risk poofing him too, and instead just balled his chakra and his attention both into the center of his gut, just behind his fingers.

He reached out with chakra fingers and didn't need to see the clones in the room all stiffen and slow to know that it happened. The tendrils of energy wanted to reach further out to the clones on errands and about town, but Naruto paid extra attention to reeling them all in. Eventually they began cooperating, quickly reaching into the clones who were slowly getting back to work. Naruto hadn't been on the receiving end of his chakra-tentacles (though some would consider the use of clones proof to the contrary), but he had the feeling it was like being groped, and Naruto had a new respect for those poor women who actually were, and a new disdain for the ones who actually did the groping themselves.

He browsed through the energy levels of his clones, finding to his surprise that, though they had all started stilted, some had run out of energy quickly enough or slowly enough that they were level with others. Naruto concentrated for a moment and stuck fingers into some, maknig sure to jab an extra-large rope of chakra into Foreman (who was being incredibly useful), Glasses, (who was incredibly arrogant, but occasionally pointed out large mistakes just before they cost enough more time), and Cheery (who was being incredibly ...cheery).

When they were all at a nice uneven level, Naruto nodded, not sure whether his body was mimicking the act in the real world, and, for that moment, simply not caring, either. The kyuubi-vessel traced the tentacle of chakra to the cheeky, backstabbing clone with the intent of poofing him out. But, as he twisted his own chakra and the clone's together, he felt a sharp tap on his shoulder in the real world. Reluctantly, he untangled threads of thought, making sure to shake his head and hurl thoughts that weren't his off into the distance. He glanced up, and Sarutobi was covering his mouth, faking a cough in what had to be the lamest attempt at a gentle interruption Naruto had seen in at least a day.

"Could you explain to me, Naruto, exactly what you plan to do with that clone? "Poofing", it said?" The Hokage's gaze was searching, and Naruto sighed for what seemed like the fifth time since entering the SAP office with the Hokage. He _really_ wished he remembered exactly what was on the Forbidden scroll, just so he could get a heads up about what unspoken or well-known rules of chakra, physics, or universal time travel paradox theory he was breaking.

"It's when they, you know, explode into a thousand tiny bits of nothing." Naruto waited for an instant, and the fact that Sarutobi glanced down at him with thinly pressed lips made him sag his shoulders, knowing at once that he couldn't get off that easily. "See, lately I've gotten good at giving and taking energy to and from my clones."

"How good," the Sandaime began, thin lips twisting into a smirk that seemed more at himself than at Naruto, "and what do you mean by lately?"

Naruto tapped his foot on the floor for an instant, surprised when it hit carpeting and not paper and/or moss that had evolved the defense mechanism of _looking_ like newspaper. "Eh. Well, I started doing the whole "taking" thing yesterday. Got pretty good at that quick. The giving part?" Naruto scratched his eyebrow. "Well, I know I used it at BIRCH. Sorry Old Man - that's the earliest time I really see it sticking out." The fact that Sarutobi could look intimidating while half-naked and sweaty was a skill that, suddenly, Naruto wished he would never, ever receive. "Anyway!" He said a little louder than usual, hoping that the loud noise would make his brain explode, freeing him from horrible images forever, "I'm pretty sure that Kage Bunshins are supposed to poof when they get smacked. Mine do eventually, but it depends on how much chakra I stuff in 'em. I can poof 'em by touching 'em, and also remotely." Naruto gestured towards the offending clone, who had his arms crossed impatiently. "That's what I was gonna do with that snotty bastard."

Sarutobi nodded. "I see. And you just will those parts of you to dispel? How can you differentiate between them?"

Naruto scratched one eyebrow. "Well, he's not a "named" clone. You know, Foreman, Glasses, and Cheery." He paused. "Huh. I wonder if I'll get any more of them. Anyway, unnamed clones just... well, I concentrate on what the did to irritate me."

For a moment, Sarutobi's lips moved, forming words only to himself before he directed his gaze to Naruto's eyes. "You sound as if you don't know about your "named" clones, Naruto." Before Naruto could shake his head in a resounding "Nope! No clue!", Sarutobi tapped one finger against his chin (again defying all laws of reason as he looked dignified shirtless), "Could you explain to me what exactly they are?"

Naruto scowled. "Listen, are we sorting paperwork or are we ..." He trailed off. "Hell. I did promise you some questions, didn't I?" Sarutobi nodded with what _had_ to be a smirk on his face, and Naruto hung his head. "Dammit."

Across the aisle, he caught Foreman's sympathetic glance, heard Glasses' snort through the bustle and movement of the clones in the aisle, and saw Cheery completely oblivious to the world around him as he flailed his legs in a feeble attempt to free himself from six solid inches of spiderweb.

"I don't know. I'm pretty sure I'm not crazy. It's not like they're multiple personalities or anything. Except, well, okay, they do have personalities, and there are more than one of them inside of me." He paused, and he looked at his pointed fingernails for a moment before continuing. "They're not the fox. I already thought about that, you know. Even _I_ know that Glasses sure as hell isn't not normal."

Glasses scowled over the pages of "Proclamations", and Sarutobi nodded. "Yes, point taken."

"I guess that the memories are what separates those guys from the rest of me. Well, them." Naruto ran one hand through his hair, realizing too late that there was a solid rope of spider silk attached to it. He grimaced and tried (in vain) to flick it onto the nearest deserving target.

Sarutobi didn't look amused.

Naruto finally wiped the strand on one of Cheery's legs as he hauled the younger-acting clone out of his box (with the aide of the other nearest Naruto). Cheery laughed and moved to scratch the back of his head, apparently forgetting about a medium sized scroll still in his hand. Even Sarutobi (deaf as he had to be from being older than most buildings in Konoha) winced at the crack, and before Cheery could do more but water piteously in the eyes, Naruto stepped forward, dug in his pockets furiously, and brought out a handful of fruit flavored hard candy. In the shinobi handbook, one of the ways that shinobi could deal with nosy children during infiltration missions was to silence them and _not_ kill them in the process.

At the time it was first introduced, it was considered a revolutionary, heretical concept.

Naruto kept a few pieces of gum, some hard candy, a bar of chocolate designed not to melt until chakra was applied to it, and a small bag of sugar sticks with him at all times. His reasoning was that the gum could be used as adhesive for everything from exploding tags to prank components, the hard candy kept shinobi from getting too thirsty on those long, boring waits, the chocolate could be traded with village children for favors, and the sugar sticks insured that if children were hateful, spiteful, noisy little brats, they would be hyper enough after ingesting pure sugar that their parents would get the punishment that they truly deserved.

Cheery's watery eyes widened, a grin slowly broadening on his face. "For me, boss?" Naruto couldn't do more than nod once before Cheery scooped up every last candy with what could be nothing short of a gleeful squeal. He hugged Naruto around the shoulders, danced in place for a second and eventually slowed in rotation when he noticed all eyes in the office focused on him.

"Eh? Oh, you guys want some too? Yeah! Boss is awesome! He has enough for everyone, I bet!" Naruto wondered briefly if this was what Iruka had to put up with for all those years.

Luckily, most of the clones just shook their heads in disdain (Naruto figured they inherited that from being around Glasses), while a few others did eye up and steal a few pieces from Cheery. Naruto was especially surprised to see Foreman nudge himself closer to Cheery, fingers curved as if to take a few pieces for himself. Just as Naruto was about to admit there were things about his clones he'd never understand, his main clone untangled the scroll's ties from Cheery's fingers, held it up to the light from the doorway while turning it this way and that, and hurled it at Naruto.

The shinobi was especially glad for his fine ninja reflexes because if the case had actually hit his _hand_, it might have been hurt. The forehead, however, was a perfectly acceptable landing zone for a scroll that felt like it weight twenty pounds, filled with nothing short of bricks and evil intentions.

The blond barreled over into the next person in line. As it so happened, that was the Sandaime Hokage. As it _also_ happened, the Sandaime Hokage was still half-naked.

The screams of horror, pain, and torture were enough to make every clone in the building freeze up for an instant. Naruto was sure there was no god in heaven looking out for him because every liver spot, every haired wart, every battle scar and every puckered fleshy node of indeterminable usage was completely visible to horrified eyes. Naruto was _also _rethinking his position on the Kyuubi not being made of evil and malice, because the forest creature took that instant to activate it's enhanced eyesight, allowing Naruto to view sweat and pores in a manner no human had ever dreamed of before.

Naruto had froze in a state of catatonia by the time the Sandaime sighed, pulled himself upright despite the weight on his chest, and the groans and grunts it took to do so. He waved one hand in front of Naruto's eyes a few times, a fact which Naruto only vaguely registered in the back of his mind - the part that wasn't filled with evil, sickening, _gross_ things that made him want to reach for a kunai and end all the pain and suffering there.

"'Glasses', was it? A little assistance?" The Sandaime's tone held something like laughter within itself, and if Naurto had to name it, it also held more than a little bit of embarrassment. Later, Naruto would absorb the fact that Foreman glanced at Glasses, and Glasses glanced at Sandaime, and all the clones glanced at each other before giving the snobbish clone enough room to pass through unpoofed. The fact that he'd remember this scene from a dozen different view points still threw him for a loop.

"'Boss'." The mocking note in the clone's words let Naruto know that yes, it really was Glasses. It was a word - a title - that hadn't ever passed through Glasses' lips before, and it could do nothing but sound either mocking or of very indeterminable sincerity. "You'll never become Hokage if you don't stop screaming."

Naruto whimpered.

"You'll never become strong enough to protect the village and the people who love you within it if you don't get up." Glasses had a smirk which, despite being the first thing Naruto really focused on, also managed to be the first thing Naruto truly wanted to punch since he'd woken up. But, Naruto's fractured, broken mind eventually split and reformed the clone's sentence until he understood it. "People who love you" no doubt referred to Makoto and Haruka (with the possibility of his team squished somewhere in there, and Iruka as an unstated truth), and Naruto was pretty confident that, even if he explained the circumstances, all of them would be rather irate (though, Naruto's first choice of words was "pissed" - something he couldn't yet equate with Makoto) if he slashed out his eyes.

Still, Naruto couldn't hide the shudders of trauma that wracked his body as he pulled himself away from the Sandaime. "The pain." He whimpered. "The agony."

Sarutobi sighed dramatically as Naruto finally gained enough strength to pull himself off of the old man. "That scroll couldn't possibly have hurt you that badly, Naruto. You're a ninja."

"No." Naruto whispered. "Not the scroll."

Naruto slowly twisted his head around, hoping that he could hide some of the horror on his face as he glanced at the Sandaime's raised eyebrow. "Then," the Hokage pressed, "exactly why were you..."

"Your naked chest." The word caused five Narutos down the line to full body shudder in sympathy. Cheery glanced at them with a completely confused expression on his face, Naruto saw for the first time the embarrassment plain on Foreman's, and Glasses sighed theatrically while extending his hand.

Naruto pulled himself upright (in more ways than one), and brushed off what he hoped was all traces of old man on his sweatshirt. "It was horrible."

The Kyuubi-vessel wasn't sure how the Sandaime would react to that comment, but a _pout_ was so far down on the list of possibilities (which included "Banning Naruto from Konoha", "Banning Naruto from wearing Orange ever again", and, worst of all, "Banning Naurto from Ichiraku's") that it didn't even register until it was already wiped off of the old man's face.

Glasses bent down quickly, and at first Naruto thought with no small amount of shock that the clone was actually going to help the old man up. Instead, the clone's stubby fingers deftly scooped up the scroll, and the clone turned his back on the old man before holding the case up to the light in much the same manner as Foreman, but with no small amount of creepy reverence mixed in.

Sarutobi accepted Naruto's hand with a small nod and a lingering frown, and Naruto shuddered. Despite the fact that, yes, he was rather starved for physical contact (he could count the number of actual "hugs that were meant to be hugs" in one breath), Naruto decided that he'd much rather have physical contact with _girls_ from now on, thank you very much. With a swift pivot, Naruto twisted until he was positioned where he could see over Glasses' shoulder. The clones went back to busying themselves, the occasional calls of "Chick named Ran, delinquent reports?" and "Need some extra trash bags here - this one's full of vacation brochures... and spiders." mixing together and gradually fading into the background.

After a few moments of twisting as Glasses was deliberately moving his head between Naruto and the scroll, the clone heaved a sigh and nudged his shoulder at just an angle where, while his arm was pressed to a box, Naruto had room to crane his neck over and look at the scroll too.

It was just a case.

Naruto scowled. "Why the hell haven't you opened it yet, you dork?"

Glasses narrowed his gaze until the glare cut skin, and Naruto bared his fangs instead of turning away. With deliberate slowness, Glasses held the scroll in one hand, twisting the case until the red wax seal faced upwards. The clone showed his thumb, making sure Naruto saw the front and back of it completely empty. With a final glare, the clone went as if to flick the old, frail-looking wax with said naked thumb.

Glasses exploded with a poof of smoke, but Naruto could _swear_ he could taste Glasses' left over resentment mixed in with the slightly musty, slightly sulfuric cloud. The scroll clattered to the ground with "Proclamations", and Naruto had to quickly pick both of them up as the green moss carpeting the floor was oozing towards the items with an intent of feeding.

A quick shift of stance, a muttered word, and a hasty use of Foreman as a focus allowed Glasses to readjust his spectacles, take the scroll and book silently, and scowl. After a moment, Glasses met Naruto's eyes with an expression that was long-suffering. "You really should've remembered that."

It only took Naruto an additional moment. "Oh, hell. It's the same as the seal on that scroll in BIRCH, right? The map written and drawn on by P-".

Glasses widened his eyes and shook his head almost imperceptibly. Foreman down the row froze in the middle of carting a newly filled box over his head, and Cheery hummed a little song to himself, shaking his head as he crowed at the lyrics in an attempt at being silent.

"Er, yeah." Naruto stalled, clearly seeing the Sandaime's rather interested looking reflection in Glasses' lenses. "The map written by ...probably the Yondaime." Foreman relaxed, seamlessly falling back into routine while Glasses snorted to himself. "Anyway, that was the seal that hurt like hell, right?"

Glasses rubbed one side of his chin with the worst mimicry of innocence that Naruto had seen since the last time he'd seen Kakashi. "Hm. Well, after forcibly being dispelled, I'm still not sure. Why don't you try it to find out?"

Naruto scowled. "Prick."

Glasses smirked. "You really shouldn't say such mean things about yourself, "Boss". Why, people would think you have emotional problems." Naruto hardly opened his mouth to confirm that yes he did, and it was probably required by the academy to graduate, before his clone continued. "Emotional problems like Uchiha Sasuke, I mean."

Naruto's mouth closed with a sharp snap. There was a pause. "Alright. Got your point." There was a significant throat clearing behind him, and the blond quickly twisted around. "Ah, right! You."

Sarutobi raised an eyebrow. "I have to say that the list of people in Konoha who would refer to me like that is a very short one, Naruto."

Naruto shrugged. "Their fault. You probably deserve getting called worse. Like "Dork" and "Nerd" and "Geek" and... well, you probably get the point ."

Sarutobi laughed, and Naruto was reminded of how he always felt that, despite being older than Naruto's _grandmother_ and fire combined, the Sandaime had the warm, rich, deep laugh of a much younger man.

When, of course, he wasn't cackling in evil delight.

"I have to admit, Naruto, that even _I_ am interested in seeing what would happen if you called me that in a crowd." While Naruto had had his back turned, Sarutobi had donned the thinnest layer of his armor. Naruto wasn't ever so glad to see anyone wearing clothing as he was in that moment.

"Eh. I'll probably get lynched or stomped on if I do that." He paused. "I'll hold back on the idea, though. Maybe I can get Sasuke to do it one of these days." Sarutobi shook his head, and Naruto pretended not to see it. "Anyway, I just remembered that, yeah, I probably should ask you about opening this sealed document. Pretty sure it's written by the Yondaime."

Sandaime hummed to himself for a moment. He extended one hand, and Naruto obediently fitted the case into it. Instead of opening it himself, which was what Naruto was expecting, the Hokage twisted the scroll so that the seal caught light at different angles. He held one thumb above the seal, and, although the old man's flesh didn't touch it, Naruto was greatly surprised to see a small smark, almost like static electricity, travel between thumb and wax.

"You always were a crafty fool, Yondaime-sama." Somehow, hearing that name, and worse, that _honorific_, come out of Sarutobi's mouth was very, very strange. But, as the Sandaime handed back the casing with a firm affirmative nod, Naruto's curiosity quickly over rode everything else.

Oddly enough, the seal didn't hurt this time. This was fortunate, as he'd forgotten to brace his clones with extra energy and, had it been like last time, boxes, papers, scrolls, and trash bags would've all toppled to the floor, ruining hours of work. As it was, Naruto felt a small tingle - almost like the brush of a fly's wings against his skin - before the seal tore loose of the paper on one side and the scroll came open.

Naruto didn't expect the small cloud of dust to come billowing out, and, because of said cloud, almost missed the scroll before it hit the ground. He _did_ miss a small, deceptively heavy book, a small assortment of paperweights with old leaf imprints in them, and a separate, smaller scroll case in dark blue.

Luckily, none of these items landed on the irate, hungry floor. Unfortunately, all of these landed on Naruto's feet.

After the expected hopping, swearing, and bumping into things, Naruto settled down enough to squash the urge to fling the Yondaime's collection of paperweights through the door. Instead, he gathered the items up, passing a few of the stones to Glasses' hands. The clone quickly gave the stones _back_ to Naruto and instead took the scrolls.

Some of the stones just had pictures of leaves, some had the actual look of fossils, and some Naruto recognized as being sold in one of the civilian gift shops for an exorbitant price. Naruto passed a few of the stones to the Sandaime and set the rest on a nearby sturdy box, his attention focused on the book which had so slighted him.

Naruto was almost disappointed when he saw "Rules of Conduct for Combat and Daily Life" written in bold uppercase on the front cover, subtitled by "Konohagakure Edition g.v.7.1". The inside cover of the hardback book had a small series of numbers penciled in at the top. Naruto couldn't make them out, but did recognize the script on the second title page, which, under the previous two title lines, had "So You Want to be a Ninja..." in his father's hand.

A fresh burst of excitement made Naruto's fingers flick through the pages far faster than those same fingers had ever flicked a shuriken. It seemed that every page had comments littered throughout, trailing through the margins, arching on the tops of the pages, or drifting through the bottoms. Naruto was careful not to bend the pages too far, or turn pages too fast, because post it notes carried on what seemed like entire rants, and one section - Naruto thought it said "Treatment of Prisoners" at the top - had all of the book's text angrily crossed out with large black pen and replaced by a huge stack of folded paper which, at the peek Naruto had managed, looked to be written hastily, angrily, and with a wide variety of new, exciting curse words.

"Ah," Sarutobi spoke, and the fact that Naruto had actually forgotten the Sandaime was there in the first place made him nearly drop the book. As it was, he reflexively hunched over, protecting the book by drawing it further to his chest while his arms drew close to avoid being pulled out. "So," he continued fluidly, "it wasn't lost on that night."

"Huh?" Naruto managed intelligently. "I mean, what are you...?" He trailed off as the Sandaime pressed against him, waving one arm swiftly in an attempt to gain Cheery's attention. After another try and a sigh, the Foreman snapped his fingers at Cheery, who glanced up quickly (and, to Naruto's rather experienced eyes, guiltily), and finally turned to regard the Hokage.

"What else, 'Cheery', is in that box?" Somehow, the named seemed further ludicruous coming out of Sarutobi's lips.

Naruto saw Cheery's lip quiver. "Shucks. You caught me." With a tremble, the orange-suited clone wiped the corner of his mouth (which Naruto finally noticed had a brown smear on one edge) with his sleeve. With a grunt of effort, the clone lifted up the box and passed it back up the assembly of Naruto's until it reached the Original and the old man.

Sarutobi lifted up one end of it and backed up far enough that his back hit the wall and, instead of continuing to the kitchen where, after all this time, they'd cleared enough space for another person to stand (or sit, if they were very, very creative), instead gestured for Naruto to stay where he was.

Sarutobi carefully shuffled through the box while Naruto watched impatiently. First off was a thick layer of web which had a suspicious Cheery-shaped hole. The Sandaime actually lifted it up, attempted to glance through it (though, the attempt failed because of the large colony of cocoons spread through it) and gestured for one of the clones to place it in a new trash bag. Naruto resisted the urge to correct the Sandaime by replacing "incinerator" with "trash bag", but had the strange impression that, in the end, he would regret it.

The old man was mumbling under his breath, and the fox caught words like "classified", "unorganized", and "acceptable risk" in between elbow-deep massive archaeological digs. After shuffling for what seemed like a number of minutes, Sarutobi began handing Naruto scroll after scroll. Some were blue, others red, some were wrapped in ribbons, one had the same smell as Kiba after a rainstorm, one was half covered in slop, another was red-hot to the touch, and the box didn't seem to be more than half empty at any time during the process.

With a confused curve of the eyebrow, the Sandaime pulled out a slightly dusty, half-empty box of chocolate pocky. He turned to Naruto, who couldn't help but feel the same sense of confusion, and then to Cheery, who glanced at the box with the pain and suffering of one who has been separated from their One True Love.

There was a sigh, the sound of a toss, and then the enthusiastic squeals as Cheery danced in place. "Do you think it's wise to give him more sugar? I mean, he's ...the way he is _enough_." Naruto watched the old man rub the bridge of his nose.

"If I were you, Naruto, I'd be more worried about the fact that that particular box of pocky is fifteen years old." Sarutobi laughed. "It was already open when 'Cheery' found it, by the way."

Naruto paused. "So, the Yondaime was munching on, what, three year old pocky?" At the Hokage's nod, something inside of him wished that his father was still alive, just so Naruto could tell Makoto and watch the resulting violence. Makoto's reaction to the fact that he had - and drank - three month old milk was bad enough, but Naruto had the idea that the chastisement would be a whole lot sweeter if he was _watching_ it, not receiving it.

"This," Sarutobi spoke, "contains all of the Yondaime's artifacts from the night of the attack." The fact that the man could speak the last part of that sentence without flinching or hesitation made Naruto respect him even more than before. The fact that he did so while looking Naruto in his eyes made the kyuubi-vessel want to lick his lips and glance away.

"So, you guys were the ones who sealed these all up? I _thought_ it was strange about the-"

Sarutobi shook his head. "You misunderstand me. These are the way that the Yondaime left them." The Sandaime gestured towards the box, the scrolls on Naruto's arms, and the scrolls even know being fondled lovingly by Glasses. "The Yondaime, you'll remember, was not only a master of creating new seals, but also new uses for them."

Naruto scratched the back of his head. "Geez. He's a lot more organized than I thought he'd be." Sarutobi glanced at him sharply, and Naruto concentrated very, very hard on looking innocent. "I mean, all the rest of you government guys suck at keeping things orderly and put together right." Sarutobi nodded, but Naruto didn't dare let out a sigh of relief. "So, each of these scrolls contains stuff on a different topic?"

"Not in the least." Naruto resisted the urge to twitch. "The Yondaime was a man of many traits. He was an ...honest man. Too honest." Sarutobi had the habit of tilting his head forward at dramatic pauses. It had taken Naruto a while to figure out that, had the man been wearing his hat, he would've looked brooding and dramatic. "He was also, in his own way, a lazy man." Sarutobi gestured grandly. "These scrolls were his way of telling his secretaries that his desk was clean even when, in reality, it was so very far from the truth."

Naruto snorted. "Geez. Anyone ever think about telling Shikamaru about seals? He'd probably learn 'em all in a week just so he'd never have to clean his room again."

The old man tapped his chin for a moment. "Ah! Yes, from Team 10. He and Asuma loiter at my house playing strategy games quite often."

Naruto nodded. "I guess." The blond stomped down the question of just how long exactly Asuma had been "loitering" at home. "Anyway," he ventured, feeling the heavy weight of his father's personal ninja handbook beneath the stack of scrolls, "what do you plan on doing with all this?"

Sarutobi made a small noise in his throat and crouched over the box again. He pulled out a scroll case in black and white, another in orange, and another in purple. He examined them critically, making sure each of them caught the light. Naruto saw, quite suddenly, red wax seals which, by now, were rather familiar.

With a nod, Sarutobi replaced all of them back into the box. "I suppose," the old man began with a note of regret in his voice which wasn't entirely feigned, "that this will have to count as one of your job duties here. Sort between official documentation and those of a more personal matter, and submit the former of those to me at a later date."

"And," Naruto began, "his personal stuff?"

Sarutobi was quiet for a moment, and Naruto felt his breath quicken because here was another perfect chance for the Sandaime to introduce Arashi as his father. Naruto knew that it would serve as a segue for introducing Makoto and Haruka to Sarutobi and to Konoha, and he knew that it would change not just their lives, but it would give heart attacks to eighty percent of the old geezers on the council. "I believe," Sarutobi ventured, each word sounded weighted and, for lack of a better word, "refined", "that the Yondaime-sama would want those items to go to his family."

Naruto's heart stopped.

"So," Sarutobi said with an incline of his head which (in theory) hid his face, I'll trust you to keep all of his artifacts in good care until... the day that one arrives. If that day should come." He added hastily.

The blond hid his disappointment with a noncommittal grunt, and waited a few moments until he felt collected. "Yeah." He paused, grinned, and captured Sarutobi's eyes with his own. "Kinda helps that I'm the only one who can open these, right?"

Sarutobi laughed. "Well, yes. In so far as I've seen. The Fourth was a fiendish trickster, and I'm rather loathe to risk incurring his wrath by opening something – or trying to – that wasn't meant for me to see."

Naruto asked one of the questions he had a feeling Sarutobi _didn't _want to hear. It was included in the ranks of "Why didn't you tell me Tuesday was 3-for-1 day at the Explosive Tag stand", "How in hell did you know that I was the one who gave Konohamaru that nail polish", and now stood side by side with the eventual redux of the Hooker Question – something which Naruto realized now could be a great asset as a distraction in desperate times. "So," he started, "why can I open these, and you can't?"

Sarutobi nodded. "Ah. I expected that you asked this." Naruto quietly envied the fact that Sarutobi didn't visibly curl into a ball. "I have several theories and they all-" The old man cut off quickly. "My goodness, is that...?" He gasped. "I do believe it's eleven. Didn't you say you had training soon? Quickly! You must hurry, or you'll be late!".

Naruto scowled. "Do you really think you're getting out of it that easily?"

Sarutobi solemnly nodded. "Absolutely. After all, it _is_ eleven. Besides, if you don't, I'll have to ask some rather tricky questions about clone composition. In fact, I'm sure that within the hour until your official meeting time, we could do some incredibily fascinating experimentation with your clones. Why, I'm sure "Cheery" alone would cause most of my "learned collegues" to go into epileptic fits."

Naruto sighed. "Yeah, he has that effect on people." The blond turned his head. "Hey, Glasses? Is the old bastard here pulling a fast one?"

Glasses paused from rotating one of the scroll cases in his hands, and answered distractedly. "I do believe that I'll refreain from the typical and expected age jokes. I assure you, however, that I have quite a multitude of them in backlog." He glanced up for an instant, a look of concentration making his eyebrows furrow. "Hm. I believe that, yes, the time _is_ correct."

Naruto made a small noise in his throat as Glasses began tracing intricate doodles on the side of the case with what was one of the creepiest expressions Naruto had seen in at least a week's time. He stood, stretched the muscles in his back which seemed to protest being half-crouched over boxes for hours on end, and shifted the heavy load in his arms. "I guess I can pick these up later, then..."

"Ah! The Yondaime had a great deal of skill when dealing with seals, but you must remember that I myself was quite well known for them in my youth." He glanced at Foreman, and Naruto noted that the Hokage could pick out Naruto's main clone out of the crowd rather easily. "Did you, perchance, find any blank scrolls so far?"

A few minutes later, a handful of clones had been dispersed to give the Hokage room enough in the aisle to lay out the scroll. Cheery enthusiastically paced out scrolls while the Hokage watched and occasionally corrected with sage verbal instruction from the side.

In the mean time, Naruto took a wide glance around the office. Within an hour of beginning what would be known later as "The SAP endeavor", the assembled Narutos had expanded the pathway to the point where either two ten year olds side by side or one adult could fit through without much problem. Though the aisles got wider, "longer" was still a problem, and the assembly-line method of cleaning didn't help more Naruto's fit in that way. Instead, it had been decided (by Glasses) that extra room gained would be used to sort the papers more precisely. As it turned out, this was already proving itself to be a very good idea as otherwise, Naruto knew that he wouldn't be able to organize even _one_ SAP office, let alone the five others that loomed on the far, dark horizon.

When he first began, many of the boxes nearest to the ceiling were automatically thrown away. Despite how valuable they might prove to zoologists, colonies of foot-wide spiders who decorated their webs with strips of paper creeped Naruto out to the point where some of his clones were getting sympathy goosebumps. Earlier, at the Hokage's persuasion, Naruto saved one of the boxes and (after wrapping it in five layers of trash bags and duct tape) sent a clone over to the Aburame compound with it and a polite note which used phrases like "Scare the living hell out of me" and "Please never use them on me, for the love of all that is holy."

"There." The words broke Naruto's thoughts completely, shattering them to the point where he couldn't, under pressure, remember exactly why he'd been staring at the spiders on the back of Cheery's uniform in the first place. "I admit that it's not as crisp as the work the Yondaime was famous for, or as detailed as the work of his sensei, but I'd like to think that it is, at the very least, functional for the time being."

The old man's hands looked large over the small red scroll case. It was no larger around than Naruto's bare arm, and barely short enough that it fit into Naruto's bag. There were no flourishes at the end, and the center of the scroll was sealed with the Sandaime's symbol. "It should open for you. It's most fascinating how your clones have a sampling of your specific chakra pattern."

Naruto nodded for a moment. "Oh yeah. Definitely. Fascinating."

The two glanced at each other. The moment stretched on.

Glasses, down the line, snapped the spine of his book noisily. The Original was already quite tired of that happening, but despite that, as Glasses stood up and eased his way over to Naruto, the kyuubi-vessel couldn't help but feel a great sense of pride, that no matter how arrogant and stand-offish a part of him could be, they would still help out their creator.

"You," the clone started, "are horrible with endings."

Naruto frowned as his clone outstretched one arm to the doorway and pointed towards the light. "Bastard."

Naruto kept one eye (and a snarl) firmly fixed on Glasses while he passed rather easily by his clones. When he came to Foreman, he nodded in acknowledgement. "If the Old Man gives you the okay, feel free to let some of the guys around town after you finish up. I'd mutiny against him if he makes you work until two or three. Might be smart to only let the the ones with the new uniform..." he trailed off, "okay, "this" uniform go out in crowds. The whole invisibility thing, you know? Anyway..."

Glasses, even six bodies behind Naruto, snorted loud enough that the blond was sure the buildings on either side could hear just how much the clone was suffering. "Endings, "Boss"."

Naruto growled. "Bastard." He twisted on his heel as Foreman nodded with an oddly solemn expression on his face, quickly whipping open the door.

He regretted it.

The first thing Naruto noticed was the fact that the rain felt like senbons being hurled from someone particularly malevolent and rather inaccurate. Sharp needles attacked the street, the buildings, and he could hear them ringing on metal sidings, glass windows, and ceramic tiles all at once to the point where it seemed like a non-stop high-pitched buzzing in his ears. Within two seconds of opening the door, Naruto and the three feet of the office directly behind him were absolutely soaked.

The _second_ thing he noticed was that "The" Fangirl stood out in front, her short skirt and shrunken shirt completely soaked. It clung to her every curve, and Naruto felt a surge of pity for her, because he knew from childhood experiences that she would soon be very uncomfortable. Clothing rode up in the worst ways in the rain.

She, and what seemed like a complete mob of her friends and associates (most of whom he remembered seeing in the morning's mob), peered with dropped jaws through the darkened doorway.

"I-I," Fangirl began, her voice choking after the first few syllables. _Tears_ glistened in her eyes. "I can see the floor of SAP. I can see the_ floor_ of _SAP_."

One balding man who managed to have a shirt completely soaked in rain and still showing sweat stains began weeping, falling onto the shoulder of an older looking woman Naruto recognized as being a witness to The Decaf Incident. Her lips – painted red with something that _had_ to be nail polish, as no lipstick could possibly be in that shade of red – quivered. "Oh, you're _amazing_, Uzumaki-sama."

"Oh," Glasses called sweetly, "you might want to watch out for the fangirls, too."

* * *

The umbrella was pink. He nearly stumbled off his third roof as he glanced up at it in a horror that hadn't faded at all yet. He had to admit, however, that where Fangirl's sense of style was as bad as his chakra control, she knew how to make a mean cup of cocoa. 

It took a certain amount of skill and style to drink scalding hot liquid with only one hand while traveling at high speeds over tall buildings in the rain. This was a skill that Akimichis learned early on, courier-nin learned out of necessity, and one that Naruto Uzumaki didn't possess.

Instead, he jumped down onto the streets, thankful not for the first time for the fact that water couldn't do anything to sandals except get them wet. The umbrella, however ugly and coated with flowers it was, did an excellent job of keeping him out of the rain. He wondered why The Fangirl didn't use it in the first place if she had it, but she'd cried when he'd refused to take it the first few (dozen) times. The short, balding man kept introducing himself (Naruto couldn't remember if his name Ryuusuke or Ken, as they both sounded alike to his highly trained ears) kept asking so many questions about how he managed to organize BIRCH that Naruto discovered he had a long-dormant instinct of chewing off his own leg. Unfortunately, he had the idea that his leg would grow back, and he'd be left to answer _more_ questions than before

The old woman had kept dusting off his sweatshirt, offering to clean it at her place, and had the habit of touching his back "brushing off spiders". While Naruto had no doubt that this was true the first ten times or so, he started to get suspicious after he realized that each poke was followed with a gasp of reverence, the same as when Fangirl touched him at the Hokage's Tower.

He was glad for what had to be the first time that Kakashi scheduled his meeting early, and took the chance when he saw it to smile at whatever they said, apologize, and run for the nearest clear path at full speed.

The streets were moderately abandoned. Thunder crashed through the hills in the distance. Naruto decided to take that as a good sign and risked a short cut through a damp tunnel. Midway through, he rested, running one hand through his hair until it spiked up (further), and searched his pockets.

The scroll Sarutobi made him of all his father's scrolls was tucked in his bag safely. Naruto's ninja supplies were in good number, and none of them seemed wet. The stain treatment Haruka had bought him for his sweatshirt worked rather well for spills, too, and he actually felt _warm_ (though, whether it was the sweatshirt or the idea of his father's scrolls and his Aunt's foresight was debatable).

Naruto tapped water off his umbrella, shook some excess water off his hair, and headed out of the tunnel, and passed a group of old ladies with rain bonnets on, a chuunin walking a dog, Sasuke under a bright yellow and green umbrella, and a group of school children with raincoats on, splashing all parties.

Naruto paused, waited another moment, and backed up a few paces. Sasuke did the same.

In that moment, Naruto realized that he really didn't spend much - if any - time with Sasuke alone when not in a battle. The times that he _did_ spend with Sasuke were usually forced on both parties, through training, the old classes at the academy, or missions. He also realized that this was probably a blessing, as most meetings with Sasuke ended with frustration on his part and brooding on Sasuke's, with a random distribution of bruises to both parties as occasion saw fit.

Naruto ran a checklist through his head of things he'd insulted about Sasuke lately and realized that, after bringing up the dark-haired boy's family the night before, caution was _definitely_ advised unless he wanted to see just how much blood the stain tempering solution could resist before it gave up. Naruto recognized that there was a long silence, and that spurned his mouth into motion. "Nice umbrella.".

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "It was on sale."

Naruto nodded. "But, seriously! Yellow's a great color." There was another pause. "Wait, why are you heading that way? The bridge is over here." As it turned out, pink umbrellas made excellent pointers, as Sasuke's eyes were almost forced to watch it.

"Why bother going early? It's not like he'll show up until three. I can get training done if you'd stop blocking my way, idiot." Naruto leaned forward, inwardly smirking at the way that Sasuke leaned back. The blond took careful note of the taller boy's pale skin, the dark circles under his eyes, the frown lines on his lips, as well as the slight twitch in Sasuke's eye that usually was a tell-tale sign that Naruto was staring too long. "Aren't you supposed to be on a "mission", Uzumaki?"

Naruto waved off his comment with one hand. "I'm finished for the day." He paused. "Wait! I know!" The blond slapped his open palm with his fist. "You stayed up all night brooding and being jealous over the fact that I got a mission, right?"

Sasuke had to be a feral dog (or else, his mother was, a thought even _Naruto_ knew better than to voice aloud) in a previous life because he managed a grade A snarl and growl. "No, I was up all night running laps around Konoha."

"Oh yeah!" Naruto exclaimed. "Man, I forgot about that. Anyway!" He started, smirking at the way that Sasuke's shoulders jumped (a sign that, if he were _normal_, there would've been actual jumping going on), "Meeting with Kakashi! I just figured out a way that this can be _awesome_."

It really was fortunate that it was raining because, as Naruto moved to grab Sasuke's arm, the taller boy stepped back and lost his balance in a fortuitously placed puddle. Naruto took that as a divine sign, grabbed Sasuke by the wrist, and pulled him forward. The dark haired boy was forced to follow for balance and, within a few steps, Naruto was pretty sure he followed just for the fact that they both knew Naruto would never let the fact that Sasuke would be soaked from the waist down go otherwise.

Naruto was pleased to see that they still managed to arrive before noon. Sasuke angrily drew his arm back, muttering obscenities and gratuitous acts of violence against nosy, stubborn blonds while Naruto leaned all his weight on the side of the bridge. Sakura hadn't shown up, but that didn't mean that someone else hadn't.

With a smirk, Naruto tapped Sasuke on the shoulder, silently drawing the symbols for "Look over there, dummy". Sasuke's head turned, his eyes widened, his jaw stiffened, all his features shifted into those of one confronted with a horror the likes of which words dare not describe for fear of bringing its evil back unto the world, all at the perfect angle for Naruto to see every wonderful change.

"Yo! Sensei!" Naruto waved. Kakashi, leaning against the signpost at the end of the bridge, shifted his blue and purple umbrella (it had pictures of dogs chasing each other through puddles along the borders) to the point where both boys could see the masked man's profile. The jonin smiled, eye curving as he waved back at the blond.

Sasuke twitched.

Naruto felt like jumping in place and cheering because seeing the spasms of Sasuke's eye and the tic of the left side of his mouth sent fresh pulses of pure glee through his veins with every movement. Kakashi gracefully walked over, whistling a tune while spinning his umbrella on his shoulder.

"Right on time." Naruto heard the subtle praise inserted in every syllable of the jonin's statement and drank every drop of it up. It was satisfying in a way that before only ramen could taste. "Ah, a late comer." Kakashi's voice had lowered in volume as he drew the umbrella closer to his face again, turning to hide the front of his body. Sasuke's hand was spasming around the handle of his umbrella to the point where it showed the marks of individual fingers, but Naruto was able to force the Uchiha's hand down to copy their teacher's position. Doing so must have snapped Sasuke out of his "trance", as he threw a choked curse word in Naruto's direction before the blond drew his own umbrella (which was, he kept realizing, still _pink_), over his eyes.

Sakura sang to herself as she twirled her umbrella - a large, dark, menacing black one with a curved wooden handle and a sharp spike at the top, both of which looked like they'd be rated for at least a chuunin-level mission, and above for very creative shinobi. Naruto's ear twitched, and he had to focus hard to make out "I can't believe Kasumi-sama wrote another sequel! Oh, this is going to be _good_". She absently rested against the other side of the bridge, roughly diagonally from her three concealed team mates.

Naruto swore he could feel Sasuke's twitch transmit through solid stone. Kakashi leaned his umbrella forward enough that one of his hands was visible to his two male genin, clearly counting down from five. Naruto nodded and poked Sasuke, who looked to be in the middle of a mental battle for self control. Naruto followed along with Kakashi, mouthing his lips until finally, the man snapped his fingers.

"You're LATE." Sasuke was only a few beats off, but the vehemence he put into the second word more than made up for horrible timing.

Sakura's book dropped onto the ground as she smoothly drew a kunai from one of her side holsters. Naruto gave her a good deal of credit on the fact that she identified exactly where the voices had come from, but deducted a great deal of points at the fact that she dropped the kunai - handle first - on her foot in utter shock.

"K-kakashi-sensei?" Despite the fact that he still adored her, he felt as if he was addicted to the way her eye twitched. She blinked twice more, then again, and then finally drew one hand over her chest, clenching her heart. "No, it can't be. Genjutsu. Genjutsu, dammit."

Naruto scratched the back of his head. Sasuke, beside him, still looked to be in the middle of a rather painful mental battle of self control. Kakashi scratched the side of his head. "Aah, well I did say yesterday that I wasn't sure how long my hair appointment would run over. As it turned out..."

Naruto nodded. "We saw Kakashi-sensei standing here as we went by the orphanage to drop off some more supplies. You just wouldn't believe how many balloons those orphans need each week. Right, Sasuke?" The blond jabbed his elbow into the Uchiha, and the fact that he did so without being stabbed with a _kunai_ in return made Naruto wonder if twelve year olds truly could completely snap and either go insane or go catatonic.

"Hey, Kakashi?" Naruto questioned out loud. "What _are_ the odds of someone Sasuke's age going insane? I mean, he looks to be..." the blond trailed off as Sasuke's umbrella snapped in two.

Kakashi _might've_ murmured "Better than you'd think", but Sasuke acted as if he hadn't heard it, which meant that either Kakashi was very quiet when he said it or Naruto had suddenly gained the ability to read his teacher's mind.

He desperately, frantically prayed that it was only the first.

"Right!" Kakashi exclaimed, clapping his hands together. Sakura and Sasuke twitched together, and Naruto tilted his (pink) umbrella until he got a full view of his team. "I'm glad we all got here bright and early, because I have some _lovely_ training ideas I'd love to get started on."

Whatever words Sakura tried to speak were muffled by breathless, gasping syllables that sounded as if they were pulled from the middle of a hysterical crying jag. "Guh" was the most eloquent of any of her words.

Kakashi nodded. "Yes, I agree. Very good point, Sakura!" Naruto raised an eyebrow in confusion, but his jonin feigned ignorance. "In light of recent events, our exercise for the day will be information gathering."

Naruto blinked. "How is that related to any of the incredibly ...well, screwed up things that've happened lately?"

The silver-haired man scratched his cheek. "Aah. Well, that would actually be related to the second part of today's agenda, actually. You see, I _was_ going to offer my favorite genins the option of choosing between stealth, deception, and detection training, but I realized last night that I actually misplaced some paperwork, and instead, we're taking a little detour to a place that you should know well, Naruto."

The blond winced. "You mean BIRCH, right? You know, there's something you should know about that..."

Kakashi waved with one hand. "You misfiled all the paperwork that I gave you yesterday in order to get out of there faster? I admit, I expected something of the sort. Ah! Well, we live another day to correct the mistakes we made the day before, right? I'm sure Sakura and Sasuke won't mind delaying their lessons for a few ...hours... while we search, right?"

Naruto opened his mouth to explain that, whatever Kakashi thought Naruto had done in BIRCH, he was _way_ off the mark when the man leaped into action, using the bridge wall to leap up onto the sign post he had been fashionably loitering at, then from the signpost onto the nearby window alcove which rebounded onto a Shinobi Highway Junction. With a sigh, Naruto poked Sasuke again, smirked at Sakura, and bounced after his teacher.

The trip to BIRCH was short and familiar. The front of the building looked familiar, though the cobblestoned street had the markings of footprints leading up to the steps through the many puddles still lining the road. A few things were different, and for a moment, the kyuubi-vessel tried to remember just what his clones did to the front of the building the day before. The sign which normally listed the hours had been taken down, the windows looked free of at least three layers of dust (though, the smears and streaks made up for them), and there was a newly placed bucket where two umbrellas were already stored. Naruto recognized the addition of another set of shinobi symbols in the front windows with mild interest. In the corner, above the strange one-eyed dog pictograph, sat the symbols for "Majestic beauty" and "Hero to all of Konoha". What creeped Naruto out more than the fact that he spotted what might've been a horrible rendition of a smiling fox face was the fact that he swore Fangirl was the one who drew it.

Kakashi smiled. "Naruto, care to lead us in?"

Sakura jerked her head, managing "H-wuh...Kakashi?! B-but... _early?_" as Kakashi smoothed the mask over his face.

"Yes, er, well put, Sakura." The silver-haired man mutely nodded at Naruto, and the genin sighed.

Streamers in orange and blue were tucked between the ceiling panels and trailed to the floor while small festival lanterns were hung under the fluorescent lights. The two old men related to Fangirl were decorated with bright gowns that, at one time, had served Konoha well as banquet table cloths. The one potted plant of indeterminable vitality had small ornaments on it's drooping branches which Naruto vaguely associated as being used in the fall festival.

Naruto wasn't sure if it was the absence of the looming stacks of paperwork from the day before or the presence of a small group of people who wore strange looking orange pins next to their leaf symbols on their shinobi uniforms which affected Kakashi more. It might've been the fact that, as Naruto entered, all the office clerks – he had to delete "clergy" from his mental train of thought, despite the worshiping looks on their faces – stopped talking at once. Most were men, though at least two or three of them were female or creatures close to it, though Naruto couldn't be specific about who was what, or how often.

"U-Uzumaki-sama!"

_That_, Naruto decided, was the final straw. Kakashi's eye widened, his jaw twitched, and he actually had to cover his mask with one hand to keep the hysterical choking sounds from escaping. For a few moments, he seemed to be in stereo with Sakura who, showing again the grace and aplomb he'd grown to love about her, was pointing at the leader of the fan pack with an outstretched finger and something that was either astonishment or agony on her face.

Naruto wondered, briefly, if she recognized the fanboy as one of her own kind.

All three of Naruto's companions seemed rooted to the spot. Sakura seemed as if all the shock had sauteed her mind, Kakashi seemed to be in the midst of a great internal debate about how exactly to regain his composure and (long lost) dignity, and Sasuke's internal anger seemed to be burning the floor tiles around him to the point where they would shortly melt. Naruto rubbed the back of his head as the short, balding, glasses wearing shinobi clerked came near him. "So," he began, "where's that Amano guy who works here?"

His simple question sent ripples of astonished whispers through the assorted crowd. "I'm sure that, if he could be here, Uzumaki-san, he would be so grateful that you remembered him."

Sakura sputtered and choked, and Naruto could _feel_ Kakashi's mental gears clinking and clattering as his thought process started up again. "Eh," the blond said, "I don't know about that. What, is he back in the hospital again?"

The man nodded. "Unfortunately, yes. I've worked with Amano-san before, and though I've never met him, that Hatake fellow must be a true monster to have traumatized such a sensible man like that to such a horrible degree."

Naruto lifted his chin and forced the sides of his lips not to curve as he nodded. "I'm sure that whoever this "Hatake" fellow is, he doesn't even remember Amano Ryuuzuki from the dozens of other genin he's traumatized over the years."

Kakashi sighed heavily. "That's enough, Naruto. Explain what's going on."

The blond grinned, fangs visible as he finally released the chuckles tickling the back of his throat. "Man, you really should've seen your face, sensei!" Naruto peeked from a squinted eye and saw that it was Kakashi's face at _present_ he should pay more attention to. The blond stiffened, adopting the same straight posture he (occasionally) used to look good on missions or when reporting back to the Hokage. "Yesterday," he began, choosing to ignore how some of his fans (which was the creepiest idea since Sarutobi's naked, glistening chest) shuffled to within earshot, "You gave me all those papers to organize and sort. You know, the mission reports from the other teams that you were too lazy to do yourself? Well, I..." he trailed off for a moment and glanced to his left as he thought up an excuse for the uninformed around him, "was on a tight schedule 'cause I had a dinner appointment, and to get it all done, I kinda used my Bunshins."

Naruto glanced around. "A lot."

Kakashi said nothing, instead walking towards the door to the archive office. The crowd parted around him, and one or two of the fans began muttering to themselves. Naruto caught "Aren't masks symbols of the Hatake clan?" and "Just because he copies techniques doesn't mean he'll remember _us_, right?".

Naruto poked Sakura in the arm, deciding to let Sasuke steam, and jogged after his sensei's long strides.

The file room looked just as clean as Naruto had left it the day before. The lights seemed brighter when reflected against the crisp, neatly labeled boxes which were cataloged on the shelves, and the quiet rattling of the exhaust fan was far more muted than it had been days before, as a liberal application of polishing liquid kept the blades glossy and the center of the fan slick enough to keep from squeaking.

After seeing SAP, BIRCH seemed like child's play when compared to the same standards. Naruto didn't remember which one, but a clone had zipped past the aisles with the closest equivalent to a mop ready at the time, and most of the shelves had been dusted (with the exception of the very highest shelves, which even three Naruto's stacked together couldn't reach). The odd statues and figurines looked just as ugly on a new day as they had when Naruto had first seen them, but Kakashi brushed a few with his fingers very carefully, picking out ones he recognized from their large groups.

"So," Naruto said, stretching his arms behind his back, "you can kinda see that I took that note you wrote yesterday as far as I could. It said I could do paperwork, or something to that effect, right? Anyway, you didn't specify which _era_ that was limited to. I had tax forms mixed up there, and because you didn't specify what I was supposed to do about _that_ either, I did those too."

"You did my _taxes_?" Naruto hadn't _ever_ heard he's teacher's voice reach that high. Pure, unadulterated, raw fear radiated from Kakashi to the same degree as if the Kyuubi himself (or, worse, the husbands of the many women he'd ogled over the years) stood in front of him, irate, frothing at the mouth, and possibly on fire.

Naruto scratched his cheek.

"Oh, I do remember him saying something like that during yesterday's mission." Sakura stated. The blond glanced back at the kunoichi, noting how collected and calm she looked, and wondered even further at how she could go from insane to timid in point two seconds while being at the same time one of the worst liars he'd ever met.

The kyuubi-vessel gathered the courage to glance into Kakashi's eye. "You were the worst one to do of any of the jonin-sensei, by the way. I mean, Kurenai's handwriting sucks hard, and Sarutobi's kid had deductions for things I can't even look at legally for another six years, but you...geez. What wasn't filled out wrong, scratched out in permanent marker, or filled in with the wrong color pen was pretty much added up wrong in the first place." Naruto cracked his knuckles above his head. "Plus, you completely missed the sections which included information about _us_", he said, gesturing to Sakura and Sasuke, and then himself. "That _does_ come in important when you're claiming to be a jonin sensei, you know? Anyway, I fixed that and brought your refund up about five."

"Dollars?" Sakura asked with a raised eyebrow and a burgeoning smirk.

"Thousand, yeah."

Sakura's aplomb fell apart much the same way that an expensive vase would with fifteen explosive notes attached to it. "_Five...thousand...dol-"_. Midway between the last word, she inhaled sharply, shook her head slowly, and began clenching and unclenching her fist. "You're kidding, right? I mean, you couldn't really do paperwork. Naruto, I've _seen_ the tax forms my father has to submit. Shinobi forms should be even _more_ complicated than that, and you...you..."

The Elder Fan stepped forward. "It's amazing, is it not? My learned colleagues were just as stunned as I was when the word spread that BIRCH had been tamed by you, Uzumaki Naruto-sama. But, with today's events, we've made it our mission to make sure that there isn't an office employee, whether secretary, clerical worker, or janitor, who doesn't know of your grand deeds."

"'Recent events?'" Kakashi squeaked, focusing a sharp stare at the back of Naruto's neck. The blond turned.

"Well, yeah. SAP." The kyuubi vessel pivoted on his heel towards Sasuke, nodding. "'Shinobi Archival Program". Basically, it's where paperwork goes to die. Except, it doesn't, and it just sits there, gradually gaining intelligence and the will to devour all life."

All office workers nodded in tandem.

Naruto cocked his head back to his teacher. "Last night, when you read that address, I thought you recognized it. If you did, what did you _think_ I was doing there today?"

Kakashi brought his hand slowly up to his hitai-ite, briefly resting gloved fingers against the metal plate. "Occasionally, the Hokage has been known to use "that place" as a punishment." Kakashi's gaze was suddenly intense on Naruto's forehead. "What did you manage to do?"

There was something in the way he nearly breathed the question that forced Naruto to think his words carefully. His fans (something which, no matter how much he tried desperately not to think about it, generated a continual field of "creepy" in the background) inched closer, leaning forward with eager, almost rapturous expressions on their faces.

"Well," the blond said, scratching at one side of his mouth, "I'm still working on clearing it out. Kage Bunshin or no, no one could clean that place in a day." There were understanding nods from all educated parties, while Sakura raised an eyebrow and Sasuke twitched. "Anyway, I started peeling trash away, removing some of the mega-spider colonies (those things are _huge_. Huge and _spiteful_.), and pretty much doubled the space of the aisle so far."

With a shriek, one of the secretaries swooned, caught at the last moment by one of the other fans who had the grace not to freeze up. The others watched wide eyed. A few were weeping, and one had braced himself against the desk, breathing almost as if he'd been in a heavy battle.

"Aa-and the rumors are true?" The creepy, Head Fan breathed. "You can really see the floor of SAP?"

"Yeah. Damn ugly floor. You know, for the newspapers, moss, spider corpses, and all that other stuff you have to get through, brown shag really is a crappy reward." Naruto resisted the urge to reach for his kunai as Kakashi ducked his head down. "What? I mean, it's not like I could possibly have done more than you, right Kakashi-sensei?" Despite himself, the kyuubi-vessel really couldn't keep the hint of desperation from escaping. "Right?"

"Okay! Team Seven!" Kakashi crowed sweetly, "Back to training." Instantly, Kakashi brought out papers, carefully flicking them like shuriken at his students. Catatonia and/or insanity or no, Sasuke Uchiha had the reflexes of a ninja three times his age, and caught the paper smoothly, coincidentally finally breaking his stupor. Sakura nabbed it, and Naruto only had a total of six paper cuts from the hostile, malevolent document. He scanned over it, eyes widening until, at the end, he had to blink, swallow his words a few times, and concentrate on breathing deeply.

"Sensei..." Naruto began, his words falling on deaf ears.

"Information gathering. I'll admit that this is probably much easier than I thought it would be last night, but, I suppose that this means there will be more time for your lesson – or, lessons." The silver haired man did _not_ looked enthused about that fact. "You can cross off tasks seventeen and 23, as Naruto already processed that paperwork, it seems. Otherwise, you can tell that this is a list of a few random tasks and questions, the answers to all of which can _probably_ be found in paperwork in this office. If it's not," he said with a wave of his hand, "that's not really my problem."

"Ah, Sensei? If we finish this quickly, we can then progress to our other training?" Sakura's question was greeted with a nod.

"This exercise is a test of your capabilities as information gatherers. The ability to scan information and discard the superfluous material is essential for many of the missions shinobi are called on to perform." Kakashi nodded, apparently to himself. "Just as important is the ability to perform the duties in a swift manner, no matter what circumstances." He glanced around. "Considering "recent events"," he mocked, copying the Head Fan's words, "you really shouldn't have any problem."

"So, the sooner we complete this, the sooner we can make up for all the _hours _of lost time that could've been spent on training?" Sasuke's tone was acidic enough that drops of his spittle landed on nearby fans and caused their flesh to melt off their bones, greeted by much screaming.

Sakura winced, but Kakashi nodded again.

"You _could_ even call it a race, if you wanted to add a competitive edge that would normally incite harder work between prepubescent rivals." One gloved hand rubbed at one masked mouth. "As a bonus, I'll even let the winner choose what kind of training we do." He cocked his head to one side with a smile so sickening that he nearly _shone_.

Naruto glanced around. "Uh, guys...?"

"Idiot." Sasuke spat, eyes narrowed in a deep glare that really had crossed into "squint" territory, "Don't think that just because this involves," Naruto might've only imagined the brief hesitation and minuscule shudder, "_paperwork_ I'll let you off easily. This time, I will beat you."

Sakura raised her fist to her chest, the expression on her face the very image of determination. "I didn't get the highest exam scores in the academy for nothing, you know. Research, books, paper? All of these things belong to me." The fighting spark (and the radiating Aura of Doom) made Naruto twitch.

"Would you listen for a second?" Naruto pleaded, helpless as Sakura clenched the paper in her fist, easily passing by him despite his raised hands.

"Naruto, don't think that since you've been here before that you will automatically win this contest." Naruto winced.

"Yeah, about that..." He glanced around, finally spotting one of his fans with a wide array of colored pens, pencils, markers, and what could've been crayons arranged in her hair bun. "Could I borrow a pen for a second?"

Kakashi peered over his book, frozen while turning a page as Naruto leaned against the nearest bare shelf. The blond stuck his tongue out the side of his mouth as he worked, frozen part way by the way that Sasuke was staring (murderously) at his list. With a heavy sigh, the blond scratched, circled, dotted, crossed, and squiggled until he was forced to turn the paper over and draw small arrows connecting his answers to their continuations.

He sighed heavily as he forced the paper over Kakashi's book, and was silent as Kakashi's eyes scanned it. The jonin glanced up, Naruto looked down, and Sakura, passing by, was frozen in place. "You couldn't," she began, "possibly have..." her words trailed off, horror closing her throat.

Naruto hung his head. "See, you know how I used the Kage Bunshin for that? Well, sometimes...they remember."

"They... remember?" Sasuke reiterated, one hand clenched on an idol which (aside from being one of the creations of the Shodaime's wife) was far too pointy for his tastes. "They remember what?"

"Well," Naruto began, mindful of the bated breath of the fans still lurking at the door, "it kinda depends on the occasion. Sometimes, they can't even remember the time of day or what the hell they're supposed to be doing. Others, they kinda remember...well, everything."

Sakura's hitai-ite, added with the lowering of her head, hid everything on her face and somehow managed to completely disregard the massive, spewing fountains of Killing Intent she was generating. "How long have they been "remembering"?"

Naruto picked at the back of his head, his thumb coming comfortingly close to the kunai hidden in his hood. "Well, not that long, really. They were pretty bad at it when I first started using 'em. But, the whole "everything" ...thing is new, and I really don't know how it works. Anyway, the day before yesterday? I think they remembered most of this place, and..." One of the fans at the front of the doorway was sobbing into his neighbor's shoulder. "Could you, you know, stop crying? It's really freaking me out."

"U-Uzumaki-sama." Naruto couldn't tell which one of the office clerks managed to choke off his name, but it started a cascade of whispers among the group, most of which involved shimmering eyes and expressions of complete devotion.

Later, Naruto would wonder exactly how he knew his teacher's teeth were grinding behind the mask, and would spend even more time trying to figure out if they were grinding in anger, or whether his teacher's clenched jaw was the only way he could keep from screaming. "Well, it looks like our Naruto-kun," he chirped, and while he seemed ignorant of it, Naruto couldn't help but _feel_ Sakura's twitch (translated by his senses as "pain", the sensation usually associated with her twitches), "will be choosing today's training."

Sasuke placed his figurine onto the shelving very carefully, but Naruto was aware of the way that those same fingers mutilated and destroyed a perfectly good (yellow) umbrella minutes before. Dark eyes turned to bore into his skull, splaying gooey chunks of brain matter over the surrounding areas as the sheer force of Sasuke's hatred seemed, at that time, a lot more deadly than any weapon he'd ever thrown.

"Ohhh," Naruto murmured as inspiration flashed inside of his mind. "_This_ was that bad feeling I had today, not SAP." He turned to spot Sakura's innate, building fury, Sasuke's promise of pain (though, the two could be switched and still be true), and Kakashi's silent, indiscernible expression which might have been irritation, might have been wonder, and might have been silent resignation to a terrible fate which included going through with promises of training.

"Dammit," the kyuubi-vessel sighed with a shake of his head. "I thought that the Old Man's naked chest would be the worst thing I'd run into today."

Sakura froze. "By "Old Man", do you mean Sandaime-sama?"

"Yep."

"Do you mean that you actually ran into his bare chest?" Sasuke prodded.

Naruto shuddered.

The latent anger on Sakura's features gradually morphed through disgust, horror, and something which creeped Naruto out to the tips of his toes called "curious speculation" until finally settling on something Naruto was still unfamiliar with: Pity.

Sasuke, on the other hand, simply looked like he was about to gag.

"Well", she stated, her pink hair spreading around her as she shook her head. "I really can't do anything as bad as that. You're off the hook."

Sasuke reluctantly nodded, and Kakashi shook his head. "How _ever_ do you get into those sort of situations, "Uzumaki-sama"?"

"I've actually thought about that a lot, sensei. My guess is that there's this gigantic party going on somewhere. Maybe it's heaven, or maybe it's ...not heaven. Anyway, where ever it is, and who ever is there? They're very, very drunk."

Kakashi nodded. "That makes perfect sense, actually."

* * *

Woohoo! DONE. Fi-nal-ly. 

This one is a bit shorter than my others. Hopefully, it won't drag on like my other monster chapters. I feel like I wrote this a bit differently than my other chapters, as it doesn't have the normal "Five pages of angst" at the beginning. Instead, it has massive horrifying mental trauma to share with your friends and family!

Deep thanks to everyone for commenting on this story. I keep going back and revising and reviewing my old chapters and finding new things which surprise me and remind me of long forgotten plot points as I edit my horrible, horrible grammar and cliched descriptions.

So, big thanks to my beta and proto-beta. Give a huge hand of applause to IEatChicken for actually updating her fic! I'm actually kind of disapointed – I was going to crack down and write a chapter myself.

As it is, if you see any more continuity, grammar, or plot errors, point 'em out. If you see lines that are in the wrong tense or, on the other hand, ones that are completely awesome, point 'em out so I can figure out just how I went so very wrong.

Enjoy!

Mysteri: I don't know about the rest of you, but this has got to be the best chapter so far. The bit with the spiders had me falling out of my chair because of the laughing, despite the fact that I'm terrified of the litter ----ers. If you don't review, I will sic my purple, man-eating bubblicious weasels after you. And I promice, they will be VICIOUS!! So, READ AND REVIEW DAMN IT!!.

(Note: Chapter _already_ has undergone edits for massive screw ups, both spelling and series-related. I'm glad you guys are on your toes!)


	14. Inspirational Speech no Jutsu

Chapter 14

Naruto Uzumaki was not entirely unused to being stared at. From an early age, he gradually gained the habit of ignoring the Creepy Mask Guys who watched him through windows, eventually learned to ignore the points and whispers from people on the sides of streets, and, after a great number of mistakes, finally fine-tuned his shinobi danger sense to the point where he could sense hostile intent fairly well.

The complete _lack_ of it was really throwing him off.

His_ fans (_and, for the first time, he truly understood why Sasuke nearly shuddered every time the Uchiha mentioned his own) still were huddled en masse behind them, peering eagerly through the doorway and pointing and whispering at him with rapturous shudders and squeals of delight. Even the old women in the crowd were examining him with wide eyes he could almost name as "appraising". He wondered why, deep down, it felt like there was a shudder so large it could've come from the _fox_.

Kakashi stood awkwardly, his hands fidgeting with his book, then his hair, and then the high edge of his mask. Sakura stood off to the side; mouth opening continually as if she wanted to say something until a sudden wave of shudders caused her to stop. Sasuke lurked in the bright aisle, casting shadows on the nearby statues and boxes nearly as well as a Nara. The dark-haired boy's eyes seemed to whirl and rotate furiously even without the Sharingan, and Naruto couldn't help but wonder just how strange Uchiha eyes really were.

"Alright, Naruto." Kakashi seemed to sigh, one hand itching the side of his nose. He glanced resignedly at the blond then to Sakura, who caught their eyes and had an entire silent conversation right over Naruto's head. "You have the choice between agonizingly difficult training in deception, stealth, and detection..." The jonin paused for an instant, "or, an early lunch."

Naruto paused. One part of himself was already at Ichiraku's, and while he'd gained an appetite from creating all of his clones who, even now, were still working at SAP, he'd also had a satisfying breakfast with Makoto to start with. He scratched his cheek for a long moment then opened his mouth, but he couldn't even inhale before Sakura "accidentally" jabbed him in the stomach with her elbow.

When he twisted his head towards her, she stared at him, one eyebrow still high. "You have to _think_ about that?"

Naruto shrugged. "Well, I mean it's rare enough for Kakashi-sensei to actually want to train us. I thought that if we did it quickly, we could keep him from making up dumb excuses and getting out of it."

Sakura stopped. "You know, that _is_ a good point..."

Kakashi shook his head with a soft noise. "Ah, you strike at my very heart. Why would I want to abandon such adorable genin in their time of need?"

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "'Adorable?'"

Naruto nodded his head. "Yeah, I kinda agree with the bastard. I mean, there's no _way_ he's adorable." He paused. "Wait a second, we had _plenty _of 'times of need' before this. Why do this now?"

Kakashi scratched his chin idly. "Well, I _was_ planning on heading out to the bookstore in H district anyway to pick up the new Icha Icha Companion book anyway." He leaned forward, eye arching in delight as his voice became more excited. "See, it lists stats for all the girls from books one through seven, and Ayumi-chan has alw-"

Sakura clenched the shelf of a nearby metal rack so hard that the screech of metal made all heads jerk towards her. Her cheeks flushed, and she looked contrite as she pulled her hand away to reveal visible digit divots in the metal.

Naruto glanced at Kakashi. "You know what? I think we'll go for lunch first. You're paying, right?"

The silver haired man raised his eyebrow. "Now, when did I say anything like that?" He scratched the side of his cheek, and the sound of his nail against the spandex of his own mask made Naruto think of fingernails on a chalkboard.

"Just for that, you are _so_ getting those speedo pictures as wallpaper." Sakura, beside him, raised an eyebrow. "Hey, don't look at me like it's impossible - I've done it before."

Kakashi hummed for a moment. "Oh! I think I read that in your academy reports. Wasn't it your subterfuge teacher?"

Naruto snickered. "Yep! I played hooky for the day and plastered all his walls with pictures of my..." he trailed off. "Anyway, obscene photos. Plus, I had time enough to wrap everything in his library in aluminum foil." Naruto felt that he'd long since earned the right to smirk about that. "Two layers."

Sasuke's thinking face involved a slight scrunch of his eyebrows and an incline of his nose. He seemed to glare at the ceiling resentfully for a moment then quickly shifted his gaze back to where Naruto and their teacher were standing. "Was that the reason you were gone from that class for two months?"

Naruto nodded enthusiastically. "Yep. The old man complained and bitched to the Hokage that he wouldn't teach me. They couldn't get any other teachers for you guys that late in the year, and Sarutobi just settled on pulling me out until I'd 'paid my debt.' As punishment, I had to write ten thousand lines in one of the rooms they normally interrogate people in." He scratched his cheek.

"After that was over with, they were halfway through the unit - blending into the surroundings, or some crap like that - and old man Hokage couldn't find a tutor to catch me up on it. So, as busy work, he made me clean the outside of the Hokage's tower. All of it." He paused. "You know, now that I think back on it, I guess that it was standing on that scaffolding and looking at the ugly faces of the Hokage which first gave me the idea for my greatest prank. You remember, the end of term?" He grinned. "Good times."

Sasuke, in return, twitched. "That explains..." He stopped, seeming for an instant that it was all he could do not to pull out a kunai and stab something. Instead he tensed up for a moment, the joints in clenched knuckles cracking, before exhaling deeply. "That explains so very much about you, Uzumaki."

Naruto blinked. "Well, I guess. I've never really thought about it that way." He shook his head. "Anyway, lunch?" He couldn't escape the hopeful tone his voice took at the end. "I'm already at the ramen stand, but I'm sure Old Man Ichiraku won't mind seeing me. Hell, he'll probably make enough to open a second stand somewhere, which is just the sort of completely _awesome _reason we should be going there."

Kakashi glanced appraisingly at Naruto. "Your clone?"

"Yep. Yesterday, he cleaned up more trash than anyone else _and_ had the good idea of taking those buckets of muck you guys," he nodded towards Sakura and Sasuke, "might remember down to the Hyuuga compound."

Sakura's eyes widened. "Wait, it was mid-afternoon on a clear day. The Hyuuga compound in _huge_. I remember multiple clones carting those buckets." She extended her hands almost pleadingly. "Weren't you afraid of being caught?"

Naruto shrugged. "What? I remember that they were really careful to hid behind walls and in bushes, so it's not like any of them could really see..." He stopped. "Oh, I am _so_ screwed."

Kakashi nodded. "Quite." Sakura and Sasuke agreed (demonstrated with an enthusiastic agreement and a nod, respectively), and Naruto hung his head. "Before they file an official complaint and have you called before the Hokage, Naruto, could you find yesterday's mission report?"

"Huh?" Naruto raised an eyebrow at his teacher. "Why do you want that?"

The silver-haired man scratched his cheek. "Oh, just to check something. Did you file it here?"

For a moment, Naruto glanced around the office. His fans were gazing at him adoringly, Sakura and Sasuke were still watching with expressions that shifted between anger, jealousy, and utter horror as each eventually cycled back to the facts that Naruto was doing _paperwork_ for a mission and this also forced him into a horrible confrontation with sights that men should not see and live afterwards. Kakashi, on the other hand, kept his gaze locked firmly on the blond, and Naruto couldn't help but start to feel uncomfortable about it.

"Well, yeah. Even if I filed it through the main office, this place gets copies of documents filed with civilian agencies. That park we cleaned up? It's one of the ones under civilian jurisdiction. So," he paused, turning his head towards the Head Fan, "did you guys shift anything around since I was gone?"

Mutely, the fan shook his head for a moment. He moistened his lips noisily, found his voice, and stepped forward, his head slightly bowed and his eyes never quite reaching Naruto's. "N-no." After a deep breath, the man's tone evened out. "We wouldn't _dare_ change things around."

Behind him, Sakura winced, but Naruto found the strength within him to suppress his full body shudder and replace it with a slow blink. "Ah. I see." After a strengthening breath of his own, Naruto nodded and thanked the fan (who promptly fell unconscious into the arms of his fellow devotees) and headed for the aisle of boxes.

After running his fingers swiftly down a series of boxes stamped with a variety of seals, labeled with carefully neat office names, and color coded in fifteen different color shades (as Konoha used and recognized eight different shades of green, alone), he found the box carefully detailed with the seal of that particular civilian agency.

The Kyuubi-vessel couldn't help but wonder just how much the organization of BIRCH really changed things. While it _seemed_ like it had been months ago, his hasty cleaning had only taken place days before, and yet paperwork had been completed, authorized, and sorted neatly less than a _day_, with some seeming to only have taken hours. But, while cleaning, he'd found paperwork that hadn't been completed and sorted in fifteen _years_.

Idly, he scratched behind his ear as one hand deftly pulled out the box. He balanced it against his chest for a moment, and he had to stand on the tips of his toes to see over the lid of the box. Careful maneuvering of the box's lid against his forehead and a delicate stretch of his knee for balance kept the box steady as his fingers quickly flicked to the day's new arrivals. Naruto pulled out the sheet with his teeth as carefully as his fangs would let him, and turned around.

He remembered setting everything back in place with only minor injury (a few paper cuts which quickly healed but still stung, and a cramp in his thigh), but most of his attention was focused on the strange ways that Sakura and Sasuke were glancing at him. Sasuke actually had an_ expression_ on his face, much in the same way that an actual _normal_ person would. Naruto had read more in recent days than most years of his life combined, and he had to glance over the other boy's face twice before he decided that it was meant to be taken as awe, translating further as "He actually _does_ know what he's doing in here."

Naruto entertained himself for a few moments by imagining Sasuke's mental voice mimicking Fangirl's - filled with equal parts of surprise and envy, with a dash of fear mixed in. It wasn't until he swished the idea of Sasuke afraid of him inside of his mind for a while until he realized that that particular idea really didn't taste sweet at all.

Sakura, on the other hand, seemed to be twisting herself between stubborn disbelief and mild to medium-level irritation, the sort that usually led her fist to meet Naruto's head in the near to immediate future. At the moment, she occupied her hands in what Naruto could tell was a deliberate attempt at centering herself. One hand was rubbing her temples while the other cupped that arm at the elbow.

Kakashi just looked bored, something Naruto could've predicted if he'd been blindfolded, deafened, and shoved in a small dark room the week prior. Off to the side, Naruto's fans seemed split between whispering among themselves and staring at the blond in much the same way that Naruto had seen Sakura stare at new clothes in store fronts, or Chouji at the windows of newly opened restaurants.

Naruto wandered over and, after a long moment, remembered to take the paper out of his mouth before handing it to his teacher. The silver haired man accepted it lazily, glancing over it with a half-lidded eye and, after a moment, nodded to himself.

"I suppose that I can take you guys down to the Hokage's Tower to get your pay after training." He sighed, and Naruto was sure that the silver-haired man tried to put all of his sorrow for all of the suffering he'd been through in that one deep exhale, as it sounded woeful, miserable, and utterly unbelievable.

"Pay?" Sasuke questioned. Naruto saw the Uchiha's mask of indifference quickly disguise a momentary lift of the eyebrows and perk of the head.

Kakashi nodded, mostly to himself. "I suppose you wouldn't have thought about it." The jonin turned the paper around, letting all three genin crowd in close to read the small, precise text and Naruto's barely readable, barely succinct responses. Some portions of the paper were stamped with a red seal, which Naruto recognized because of his experience with paperwork as the marking of the rather random auditing office. The Kyuubi-vessel wasn't entirely sure what that particular office's _official_ duty was, but, as far as Naruto could tell, what it's duty had _become_ was to disorganize the massive chaos that was Konoha's bureaucracy even further.

The genin had first noticed it the day he first met Makoto, and he briefly wondered if that was the event he would time the rest of his life by. More accurately, when three different clones brought copies of the same paper to Foreman with three different submittal and archival dates, Naruto (and a rather large think tank) saw that the paper - an approval from the Hokage's office to the Department of Wildlife (known more accurately as "The Nara Family") for expanding a deer pen another few acres - which arrived the most months after the others had been waylaid through that particular bureau.

Despite his best efforts, Naruto felt the subtle stirrings of curiosity build somewhere between his belly and his shoulders, and he knew for a _fact_ that it wouldn't end well.

Naruto shook himself out of his thoughts as Sakura frowned. The blond had developed the life-saving technique of judging how irritated the kunoichi was because, in general, she was usually irritated with him, and _her_ irritation would translate into _his_ pain, and it was always rather nice to have time enough to dodge.

"But, all of our other checks took weeks to approve, sensei. There's a process to these things, and just because Naruto cleaned this place doesn't eliminate the fact that our reports should pass through, well, about ten different offices."

The head fan cleared his throat noisily, and the way that the short man kept his balding head bowed forced light to reflect into Naruto's eyes. He turned his head away, squinting at the bursts of light until, after a few meaningful glances from his teammates, the blond straightened and the fan raised his head so that it reflected in_ Sasuke's_ face, instead. Naruto wasn't at all sure it was accidental, either.

"Actually," he paused. "What was your name, again?" He cocked his head to the side, his eyes actually focusing _away_ from Naruto for a moment.

The pink-haired girl looked distinctly irritated, and Naruto used all of his hard earned skills in stealth to silently inch away from her. "Haruno Sakura."

"Ah, yes. Well Saruka, Uzumaki-sama somehow found what many admin-nin consider to be the Holy Grail of paperwork." The fan glanced behind him as some of the middle aged secretaries and harried office workers nodded enthusiastically and began talking among themselves.

Naruto held up a hand. "Wait a second, 'Admin-nin?'" He glanced at Kakashi, and for once, the two shinobi were of one mind. "What the _hell?"_

The Fan leader had the good grace to look bashful. "Well, I admit that it's not an _official_ title, but it's one which we have carried with honor from the earliest days of Konoha's establishment." He straightened, something like a smug smile creeping onto his face. "It is with no small amount of pride that I can claim the Takuo family as the oldest line of admin-nin in all of the Hidden Villages. My great-grandfather rejected the first three drafts of the Konohagakure charter himself."

"You know," Naruto Uzumaki began, "Takuo is a really strange name." The blond motioned to scratch his eyebrow, but instead adjusted the strap of his bag. He noticed the Head Fan's eyes water, and suddenly felt something akin to guilt. "I mean 'strange' in a good way, of course. Just like how 'Uzumaki' is really out there, you know?"

Kakashi seemed to smile behind his mask, and Naruto took a deep breath. Halfway through his inhalation, he absorbed an idea, and that idea clogged his veins until he gave off a short choke. All eyes focused on him, and he coughed (unconvincingly) behind his hand.

"You were saying something about some paper I found?" The blond raised a finger as he tilted his head back. He licked his lips, then a fang, and then finally tore his gaze from the ceiling and shifted it firmly onto his fan. It was very nearly painful. "You're not talking about WB-247, are you?"

Takuo nodded vigorously, somehow oblivious to Naruto's quick wince. Sakura glanced first at him oddly, and then at the fan, who smiled indulgently at her. "You see, Sakuno, _that_ is the fabled 'Inter-departmental Transfer Notice.' Its function is to accelerate the transferal of responsibility between departments, but after the most recent procedure shift, the workers who normally processed it were split apart and reassigned. Because there were so few admin-nin who were skilled enough to complete the form, responsibility for it was volleyed for the last ...few years."

Naruto raised an eyebrow. "Who are _you_ kidding?"

Takuo hung his head. "I know." Sasuke seemed to quirk his head in Naruto's direction, and the blond took it as a desperate plea for information.

"See," he began with wide hands spread towards the shelves around them, "that form? I swear to god, it's been around since before Konoha." He paused. "Wait a second, yeah. It _was_ around before Konoha."

One of the younger looking old crones behind Takuo craned her head over his shoulder. With long, batted eyelashes, she crowed for Naruto's attention. "Yes. WB-247 was among the original paperwork that the founder of Konoha's School of Anything-Goes Office Work created. While it's original purpose has changed over the many years, the fact remains that few since the First have been able to use it."

A few of the admin-nin hung their heads, and Sasuke jerked his head a fraction of an inch, his eyes darting towards Naruto almost imperceptibly. The blond glanced in his direction, and the dark-haired boy forced his lips into a snarl. "What, exactly, is difficult about filling out a piece of paper?"

As one, the gathered office workers drew back. Some cried out in pain, most held hands close to their hearts, and several of the older ladies (and those who only passed as old ladies) began weeping.

Takuo raised one hand swiftly in the shinobi symbol for silence, and they began quickly muffling their inconsolable sobs.

He turned towards one of the oldest looking "women" with kind eyes, and spoke softly. "Don't judge him. He doesn't know of what he speaks."

Naruto could feel a sudden surge of what could only be righteous indignation pulse out from Sasuke, aided by an acidic-feeling killing intent which all but oozed out the dark-haired boy's skin.

Takuo seemed unaware of it, and turned towards what had to be the shortest person Naruto had seen in at least two hours. What could've passed for an particularly revolting sculpture was, Naruto realized slowly, actually one of the particularly old men who normally dominated the chairs in BIRCH's lobby. As it was, he dragged around the decorated draping like a cape, and had to crane his neck until a normal person would've been watching the ceiling just in order to glance above every one else's knees. As it was, the old(est) man shook with what was possibly excitement, possibly arthritis, and possibly the tremors of a thousand earthquakes still echoing in his bones. "WB-247." The very mention of its name sent another ripple of whispers through the crowd. "Do you still have a copy of it?"

Shinobi had an entirely different concept of time than civilians. They could travel distances in days or hours that would normally take weeks or months, they could fight for truth, justice, and the success of their village in battles which took less time to play out fully than civilians could choose what to wear in the mornings, and they could, in general, train their bodies and minds to grasp situations before the scenarios were even fully played out.

It was because of this that there was a rather large disparity between "shinobi time" and "civilian time." One of the aforementioned shinobi battles took may take less than ten minutes to those watching and by the clock, but to the shinobi actually participating in the battle, time moved at the pace where every action seemed to be deliberated a thousand times, and even internal narration slowed to a crawl.

The old man moved at a pace that even _glaciers_ would consider agonizing. Rocks would have been speeding past the old man like an Akimichi speeding past others at a buffet if they had legs, and Naruto thought that, at this pace they'd finish evolving some before the old man was done.

WB-247 was, in reality, not the worst paper that Naruto remembered filling out. There were ones that were more difficult to read, written in font so small that an Aburame bug would need a magnifying glass of it's own to read it, ones that were so complex that even a _motivated_ Nara (had such a thing existed) would've been pressed to do it, and one or two forms which had to be created solely as dares by rather bored, rather clever admin-nin of days past.

Sasuke eyed it with the same horror a normal person would an explosive tag on fire, drenched in gasoline, covered with nails, and glued to their own chest. Kakashi used what had to be his own personal bloodline limit of creeping up behind people to peer over Sasuke's shoulder. "Hn. I see." For a moment, the fact that Kakashi had such long fingers was all that Naruto could think about. Logically, longer fingers would mean that the jonin would have to do hand seals even faster than normal people in order to keep his digits untangled. Then again, it was possible that those same fingers were the secret to the jonin's success. Naruto scratched his chin, unaware of the slight furrow of his brow.

Sakura, driven by what was either insatiable curiosity (which was likely) or the desire to be closer to Sasuke (which was, of course, always lurking in the background), creeped over Sasuke's other shoulder. In a way, Naruto felt left out.

The hands that held the paper were not shaking, but most of that was likely due to the fact that the dark-haired boy seemed frozen in place. Kakashi's long fingers followed seemingly random rows rendered further unreadable due to the fact that Naruto was reading their shadows backwards.

"What does this mean?" Sakura murmured faintly. Her eyes stared through Naruto as they dragged themselves off the paper. She slowly shook her head, but it didn't erase the almost vacant gloss of her eyes. "'Shinobi Re-Zoning Access Formula Area and Identity Pass.' It...but the...the name doesn't even make _sense_." Despite herself, Naruto watched as the girl of his dreams put the flat of her hand against her temple.

Naruto desperately tried to ignore the way that his fans and his _team_ watched him. He cleaned the front of his teeth with his tongue for a moment then quickly began. "Well, originally Konoha was separated into zones. Not the "H" and "E" districts we have today, or even the "East", "West", or "By the Ramen Stand" areas that would make sense. Instead, they were normally grouped around high-ranking shinobi. It was supposed to be organized that each block or area had a certain number of capable shinobi to protect civilians in case of disasters or invasions. As it stood, that system really, really sucked. So, someone - Fumio someone or another - created a new system of classification which bent but didn't break the previous one. In order for it to work, each area would be organized by general shinobi grade level."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow, and the normalcy of the act soothed everyone around him (except, of course, for some of the rather indignant fan girls behind him, who gave Naruto the impression of being furious at the Uchiha for _breathing_ near Naruto.) "Grade level?"

"Well, there's a really complicated formula to compute that, but basically, it combines 'Initial Grade,' 'Rank Score,' and 'Technique Status,' subtracts demerits, divides by five, multiplies by three, and then," he shrugged, "I'm pretty sure they added or subtracted how much they hated that particular shinobi on a scale of one to ten."

Sakura twitched, a small tic appeared above Sasuke's eye, and Kakashi still seemed to be reading the paper, finger still tracing lines (though, if he had been mouthing the words also, no one would be able to tell). Several of the fan girls rubbed their chins knowingly, a few of the fan "boys" gazed at him with what could only be utmost devotion, and Naruto remembered at that precise point that he was very, very creeped out by the entire situation.

"A-anyway," he began hesitantly, "that was just per person. You added and divided and multiplied pretty randomly to get the group scoring, but because of the way it's done, you could have nothing but civilians in one sector and nothing but shinobi in the next, and still even out."

"Hn." Sasuke had a wide range of expressive grunts. This, of course, was only a small part of the language known as "Uchiha-ese", which included expressive hair flips, descriptive rolls of the shoulder, and an entirely vocabulary of distaste using a variety of positions and kunai. Naruto didn't consider himself a "master" of Uchiha-ese, but, after eventually forcing the Uchiha to speak more on their team than the dark-haired boy had in his entire academy career, Naruto felt that he had at least earned the right to say that he had a good idea what was going on in the other boy's head.

That single grunt was the closest thing Naruto had ever heard to complete and utter speechlessness. Sasuke was generally silent, but had witty replies and sarcastic, biting retorts stored all the way to his ears. Naruto had gotten good at picking up silent insults, and even better at actually getting the Uchiha to voice them. That grunt was the_ absence _of stored remarks.

If he desired to, Naruto was positive he would be able to see a thousand thoughts and retorts oozing out of Sasuke's ears and pooling on the floor.

Sakura mouthed something, and Naruto briefly decided that it meant: "Go back to lip reading class." She nodded her head almost imperceptibly, and she finally connected her eyes to Naruto's. "How do you get those 'Initial Grade,' 'Technique Status,' and 'Rank...'" She hesitated.

"Rank Score," Naruto finished. "Well, don't feel bad about not knowing this stuff. Technically, genin aren't supposed to. Their jonin-sensei is supposed to take care of all the paperwork."

All eyes turned to Kakashi. The silver-haired man chose that moment to crane his head so close to the paper that his entire face was covered by it. Sasuke, bent by the older man's weight to the point where it looked like he would fall over, did _not_ look amused.

"Yeah." Naruto scratched the back of his head. "I guess I can pretty much assume that this is all new to Kakashi, too." Before Sakura could do more than open her mouth, Naruto nodded to her. "Alright. Here's the gist of it. 'Technique Status' gives you points depending on how dangerous and awesome your techniques are. I mean you don't need to use ninjutsu because frankly, some genjutsu are even ranked higher. Your 'Initial Grade' is a base score taken from your last examination. For us it would be what ranking we left the academy as." Naruto sighed. "Which really sucks."

Sasuke twitched his fingers, and Naruto deliberately paused for the extra minute Sasuke needed to compose himself. "What other examinations would there be?"

Kakashi moved sharply, his shoulders perking up as his head peeked over the paper, poking Sasuke in at least five new and interesting ways. If Kakashi was trying to desperately get his attention, Naruto decided that he completely didn't see it. "Well, I guess the Chuunin exams are the soonest of any of them. To tell the truth, I'm not really sure about the others."

If Sasuke had actually possessed the muscles to, Naruto was sure that the dark haired boy would be grinning maniacally. As it was, a corner of his thin lips curved, and Naruto cursed his detailed imagination not for the first time because the idea of Sasuke _grinning_ was as traumatizing as kissing him. "Chuunin exams." Sasuke's dark eyes sought out Naruto's. "Tell me about them."

The blond scoffed. "Like hell."

Sasuke narrowed his eyes. "What?"

"Hey, I honestly can't. All I know about the Chuunin exams I learned from SAP. As soon as I stepped foot in that office, it officially became a mission with B-ranked confidentiality bindings. Even if I wanted to tell a bastard like you about it - which, of course, I don't - I couldn't without breeching my contract. And I don't even need to _tell_ you what that would do to our already awful Team Ranking."

Sakura, for all that she couldn't sense that Sasuke wasn't interested in her, could _definitely_ sense that Sasuke wasn't interested in anything but causing great pain unto one Uzumaki Naruto in that moment. Of course, by the way that the lights were flickering and by the smell of burning linoleum, Naruto could guess that anyone living in nearby buildings could also tell that Uchiha Sasuke was _not_ pleased. "Naruto," she said sharply, suddenly clapping her hands together loudly, "What about our awful Team Ranking? Or," she paused, obviously searching her memory, "what about the 'Rank Status?'"

For a moment, Naruto contemplated what would happen if he had a fight with Sasuke. Obviously, he would win completely, impressing Sakura to the point of finally going out on a date, stunning Kakashi to the point where he'd agree to teach new techniques, and stunning his fans to the point where they'd be so much in awe of him that they'd be afraid to stalk him.

Unfortunately, any shinobi battle that awesome (or, frankly, any shinobi battle at all) would inevitably and utterly destroy the surroundings. In this case, BIRCH.

Naruto had cleaned BIRCH once. That was enough.

"Ah." Naruto nodded. "Our Team Ranking is a mix of Initial Grade and Training Status. You know about Grade already, but our Status is a weird mix of how many missions we've taken, what category they fit into, what rank they were, and what kind of training we've done and how much of it. Now, I might be wrong, but I blame Kakashi for this."

Sakura nodded. "You're right."

Kakashi turned towards her. "He hasn't even said what I haven't done." Naruto had, being Kakashi's student and all, heard a grown man whine. He still hated the fact that he heard it on such a regular basis, however.

Sakura raised her eyebrow for a moment, then lowered her head and clasped her head together swiftly. "Oh! Sensei!" She whipped her up upright quickly and turned wide, glistening, shimmering eyes full of hope and admiration towards Kakashi. "I can't believe that I thought you didn't do something. Of _course_ you do everything, sensei!" She leaned forward, _coincidentally_ pressing into Sasuke's shoulder. "Right, Kakashi-sensei?"

The Uchiha, having been slightly mollified by the change in topic, quickly shifted back into irritation.

It seemed like Kakashi opened his mouth for a moment. He raised one finger, and it lingered in the air for a minute before his shoulders drooped slightly. "I know I had a point once, long, long ago."

Naruto nodded at Sakura. "Thought as much. Anyway, _if_ we did more training and missions and all, we'd get better pay because of it. However, that's not all. _Normal_ jonin-sensei do bi-monthly evaluations about progress, and those are generally used to determine pay rate increases. Kurenai's done it every time, Team Ten's sensei's only missed a couple, and most of the other jonin sensei have only missed one or two, generally because of away missions. Doing it fatefully means that there's a record of progress, and that in itself is used as compelling evidence for rate." Naruto turned towards Kakashi, one finger on his chin. "Sensei," he wondered aloud, "when was the last time you submitted a Rate form?"

"Hm. When was the last time you ran twenty laps around Konoha, Naruto?"

"...Touche."

A light began to dawn in the back of Sakura's eyes, and her mouth shifted into a curve because of it. Naruto couldn't pin down exactly why, but somehow, that very smile scared the crap out of him. "You didn't mention Gai-sensei, Naruto. How does he sort them?" She cracked her knuckles above her head, taking a (very) small step back from Sasuke. "Of course, I'd understand if you don't want to tell me..." One hand quickly pointed at the back of Kakashi's head, her eyes widened, and she mouthed something Naruto guessed meant "Now", "Gai", or "Horse".

On a whim, Naruto gasped. "Ooh. Yeah! Gai." Naruto stared at Kakashi, amazed that he didn't need to deceive his sensei at all. This was, of course, a very rare occurrence. "Well, his was-"

"Do you mean Maito Gai?" Naruto turned his head and found one fan breaking rank from the rest of the group. Her head was lowered, her foot was still extended mid-step, and whenever he caught her eyes, she fidgeted.

Naruto nodded, and the fan brought her hands (ink-stained and rather manly) up to her face. "Yep. Tall guy, green jumpsuit, bowl cut?" The fan mouthed the words to herself for a moment, eyebrows furrowed as she pursed her lips. "He submits form WT-98ty on time every year, and his pages are always ironed?"

Her eyes opened quickly, and she turned on the spot to the rest of the group. Whispers that no one bothered to mute drifted across the room, and, after much gesticulation, the entire group seemed to radiate a sense of absolute knowledge.

Kakashi twitched.

"See, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto began, extending his arms widely and forcing himself to close his eyes in a carefree way, "Gai-sensei submits those same bi-monthly forms once a month. At the beginning of his career, he did it every single week because the rate changes were so," the blond paused, laughed, and shook his head, "dynamic."

The Head fan nodded at the woman who had stepped up, and she obediently faded back into the group. He turned towards the jonin. "I believe that, after that small prompting, you could see that _all_ Admin-nin know of Maito Gai. His handwriting is crisp and clean, his forms are ever spotless, and he has the amazing propensity for submitting forms on the first available date."

The most beautiful woman of the group was easily in her late thirties. She had long brown hair, long eyelashes, and only a faint outline of a five o' clock shadow. She clasped her hands to her cheeks, her head bowing as she couldn't hide the dreamy smile creeping across her lips. "Oh, I just wish I could meet him someday."

Kakashi drew out his book nonchalantly, and though the jonin's attention seemed riveted on each page, Naruto couldn't help but notice how the jonin kept tearing the corners of each page as he turned them.

The Head Fan raised a hand to get Naruto's attention, and Naruto got a horrible image of himself as a teacher. He had the sudden knowledge that, were it ever to be so, there would be trauma for all parties involved, and whichever ones were in the three-mile radius. "Uzumaki-sama," Takuo began, somehow unaware or misinterpreting Naruto's familiar twitch, "all of what you said is, of course, correct." He hesitated slightly, obviously reluctant to continue. "However, you did ...choose not to factor in the Civilian Equivalency Standard, or the impact of the Chakra Dexterity test..."

Sasuke glanced at Sakura, who (for once) glanced at Naruto. The blond shrugged. "Well, truth be known, I didn't think the CES score would be a problem. I mean, we're given a baseline score after we get out of the academy, and frankly, I haven't seen records of people taking the Chakra Dex test in nearly twenty years." He paused. "Plus, I still don't have a clue what the hell they're used for."

Takuo leaned forward eagerly. Naruto could tell that the middle-aged man was quite pleased about actually knowing something his "Uzumaki-sama" didn't, as the admin-nin's lips curved into a smile and his hands began expressing wildly. "The Chakra Dexterity test and the CES are both used for civilian-born shinobi, Uzumaki-sama. My learned colleagues and I 'happened' to find some paperwork about you listing that fact the other day." Naruto couldn't help but note that even Takuo who, at the time, was the one actively lying, didn't try to hide the fact that he was lying. In it's own special way, it was a sign of respect.

Admin-nin were, against all evidence to the contrary, still ninja in their own right, and as such, the idea of telling the straight truth had become as foreign to them as the idea of actually obeying the law of gravity. Not actively trying to disguise the fact that they were "hiding the truth a small smidgen" (as outright "lying" was still frowned upon by some) showed respect for the other shinobi - in this case, his Team Seven - by not forcing the genin-group to expend the energy in calling them out on it.

In a small part of the back of his mind, a tiny voice inside of Naruto told him to move on to the next subject, to tread softly on ground where his parents were concerned, and to leave things lie as they pleased.

Luckily, Naruto had become quite used to ignoring the voices inside of him, as doing so would, statistically, eventually have him listening to the fox, coating the Hokage's tower with sour cream, or doing both simultaneously. Rather than take that chance, the blond gained the notion early on of spiting all the "well-meaning" sections of his grey matter.

"So," the blond began, stretching out his body until the tips of his toes were the only things still on the floor, "what did the papers say about my folks?"

Sakura shot Naruto a strange look, but as she was in front of the group of admin-nin, none of them saw it. Sasuke, beside her, spared a quick look in his direction which only rated a mild "5" on Sasuke's scale of scathing glares.

Takuo swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing ludicrously for a moment as he watched Kakashi's unchanging face. Naruto felt a sense of unease as the man's eyes latched onto his face much in the same way that the anchor of a boat would the bottom of a sea when threatened with a great storm. "As we just 'happened' to find it, Uzumaki-sama, we only saw it for a second before we, of course, sorted it to it's proper department. As it was, only one of us had the proper security clearance to even glance at it."

Sakura raised her eyebrows in a manner that both mimicked Sasuke and unsettled Naruto a great deal. "You didn't read it because it was above your clearance?"

The admin-nin reacted like a finely trained, well-experienced band of acrobats bowled over by a quick hurricane-grade gust. Five of the old "ladies" gasped and covered their mouths, not managing the strength to hide the expressions of horror on their faces. Several of the office workers collapsed, but their neighbors were too frozen with horror to catch them from their falls. One of the younger-looking admin-nin, a man who greatly resembled Amano Ryuuzuki, paled rapidly until his color was the same as milk five days over the expiration date (Naruto had, over the years, been presented with dozens of opportunities to get acquainted with all the different shades of milk and, as time passed, gained the experience needed to discern "Drink me" white from "You'll have to eat me with a spoon" off-white.).

"Of _course_ not!" Takuo's face was torn between shock-white and a winded read, and the man took a few deep breaths to calm himself. "Karusa," he began gently, "were an admin-nin to break the trust of his employer and his peers by reading something above his clearance, it would shame not only his own name, but the name of admin-nin throughout the village. It would be just as horrible as if he took an actual blade to the flesh of his fellows."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "That _has_ to be dramatic embellishment."

Naruto had gained the impression over the (unfortunate) time spent with Takuo that the admin-nin was among the high ranks of his specialty. It wasn't just because his compatriots watched him before speaking up, or the fact that he stood central among them although half of them were taller than him. It had something to do with the way that the balding man held his chin high and a small bit to do with the high puff of his chest, but a large majority of Naruto's impressions were gained from the long-resounding echo inside of the blond's own mind.

For a moment, Naruto could only scrunch his eyebrows, an act which made his forehead and his lips seem magnetically attracted. He opened his mouth for a second, words swelling his tongue until he had to swallow again and sort them in his head again. "Takuo, right?" The admin-nin looked up, puppyish devotion spilling through his eyes again. "I've heard that name before."

"Ah! You must've heard about my honorable ancestor, Tatewaki Takuo." Naruto shook his head, and Takuo only managed to hide some of his disappointment. "The shinobi who first took on the monumental task of editing the first edition of the shinobi guidebook?" A number of blank stares (some from the group behind him, though some of those blank stares might've been from boredom comas) prompted him to reel back slightly. "Takeru Takuo, who ventured off into the capital city to bravely face the horrors of the Royal Treasury Ledger?"

Naruto tapped the side of one cheek. "No, that's not it." He jerked his head up. "Wait. When I was in the academy, they kept saying that I was the worst math student they'd seen in a dozen years. One day, that stopped. All I remember about it is..."

Takuo hung his head. "Takuo Taka." The admin-nin's head eventually righted itself to the point where Naruto could make out the lingering horror clinging to the far reaches of the man's mind. "My son."

Kakashi, sensing the solemn atmosphere displayed by the gathered admin-nin, nodded. "I see. For a Takuo, that must be a great dishonor."

The admin-nin sighed heavily. "When he was born, we expected so many great things of him. But, now-"

He was cut off by a low growl. "'But, now' what? Now that he can't do math well, you're going to throw away your expectations?" The blonde's eyes narrowed slightly. "Throw _him_ away?"

Takuo reeled back for a moment until the confusion on his face morphed into what could only be titled righteous indignation. "_Never._" The man's tone was soft, quiet, and a better reminder that he was a ninja than if he'd drawn his kunai at the same time. "My son is..."

"A disappointment."

Naruto cocked his head to the side as the mute group of ninja glanced at him. He smiled. "Is that what you were going to say?" Lazily, Naruto crossed his arms behind his head, arching his back in a catlike way. "Is that what you think of me," he paused, leaning forward slightly and widening his eyes, "Takuo-san?"

"No! Uzumaki-sama, I-"

Naruto raised one hand, waiting until Takuo took several deep breaths before continuing. "Look, I probably should've addressed this earlier. The idea of people worshiping me? It creeps the hell out of me."

Kakashi bobbed his head, Sasuke nodded briskly with a noncommittal grunt which meant "Damn Straight," and Sakura raised her hands to her temples, running her fingers through her hair while managing to choke out "That's what I've been trying to _tell_ you."

One of the benefits of being a ninja was a certain confidence in ones own body. Over many battles, numerous fights (which differed from battles in that they usually involved more fists than kunai or chakra), and the occasional training session, Naruto discovered that there was supposed to be a strange grace involved with being a ninja. Shortly_after _discovering this fact, Naruto decided that grace just wasn't manly enough for him, and realized that a back flip looked much cooler than a sidestep, and only cost a small amount of pain for a great deal more "coolness".

Habits, however, form despite the best efforts of everyone involved, and Naruto flowed out of his stretch to a long-strided prowl in front of the admin-nin. The cock of his chin was stolen from Sasuke, the arch of his brow shamelessly lifted from his grandmother's regal profile, and the clasp of his hands behind his back not so much stolen as "rightfully acquired" after all the many times he'd seen the Hokage do the same.

"But, more than that," he began slowly, taking care to test the words in his own mind, "I don't want to be worshiped at someone else's expense."

Naruto turned towards a strange sound and found Sakura halfway between what could've been a breath and could've been an interruption. Her hand was at her throat, but as soon as he turned towards her, her eyes caught his for a second, and she drew the hand back awkwardly. "What do you mean by that?" She was careful not to have any hesitation enter her voice, and part of Naruto wondered exactly why.

"Takuo-san," Naruto turned towards the admin-nin, who stood straighter, squaring off his shoulders, "you have a family. I don't know if you have a wife, a dog, or a brood full of other children with pocket protectors and accounting ambitions. I know, however, that you have a_son_. Sure, he might suck at math, but frankly, I do too. Maybe he's a 'dishonor' on your family, but people have said the exact same thing about me and Konoha. I'm twelve right now, and your son can't be less than ten. Really, Takuo-san, you have no reason to worship me and not him."

Naruto couldn't hide the small smile, which creeped over his face and so, after a few moments, stopped trying to. "I was told recently by someone important to me that there are bonds connecting people. I've come to the realization that there are bonds between _everyone_ in one way or another. We form these connections with people we hate (like me and Sasuke), people we love (like me and Sakura), and even with the things we care about (like Kakashi and his porn book)."

The aforementioned ninja collectively shot the blond a look of annoyance.

"But, there are some bonds we can't make on our own. Hell, I don't think we try to, or that most people would if they did have a choice about it." Naruto licked his lips. "Family."

Takuo shook his head. "Uzumaki-sama, I understand that you...".The admin-nin trailed off, drawn by Naruto's silence and the genin's gradual stop in front of him.

Naruto scratched the back of his head. "You know, I try to tell everyone that I suck with this whole 'speech' thing, but no one really believes me until they've been around for one." He snorted. "You seem like a good guy, Takuo. Really. But lately, the idea of people just ignoring their family really pisses me off."

"Uzumaki-sama," Takuo began slowly, "my son is-"

"He's still alive, right?" Naruto raised his eyebrow, and there was only a slight hesitation before Takuo nodded. "He's young, right? In the academy?" There was another nod. "Then why the _hell_ are you going around groveling at my feet?"

Takuo drew back, and the other fans (though, Naruto wasn't sure how long he'd be able to use that title) stared at him with wide eyes and horrified expressions. "B-but, you organized BIRCH and SAP! No other shinobi in Konoha's history has managed that!"

Naruto closed his eyes and held up his hand. "First off, I haven't organized SAP yet. Sure, you can see the floor for the first time in decades, but when that happened in _my_ apartment, I didn't start bowing to the almighty mop." For a moment, Naruto had almost entertained the thought of mentioning Makoto. While all credit should've gone to her (and rightfully so), even _he_ knew that the best place to work in his most revealing secrets was_not_ in the middle of chewing out the same person who would probably do her registration paperwork.

"Secondly, I didn't have a clue that I was doing anything special when I organized BIRCH. I just wanted to eat dinner, okay? If you start worshiping anyone, it should be Ichiraku. _He's_ the reason I worked so quickly. Besides, he needs a bigger fan base. I mean, I have a whole box of pins that no one in Konoha will wear, and I'm pretty sure they'll start to rust after a while."

"Thirdly," Naruto continued, suddenly wary of the intense building silence of the room, "he's your son." For a moment, he could hear Haruka's voice in his ears more clearly than his own. "'You can't choose who your family is, and you don't need to like it, but there are bonds, however faint or distant, between a mother and a daughter, or a sister and a brother, or..." he finished firmly, finding his own voice, "a father and a son.

"I don't want to get to far into it because frankly, Sasuke's watching and I don't know if the bastard will use this against me later." He began, ignoring the way Sasuke bared his teeth in proof that he had to be the bastard son of an Inuzuka somewhere down the line. "Not all of the bonds in my life are good. Hell, if I'm going to be honest, I might as well go through with it all the way. _Most_ of the bonds in my life aren't good. But, the worst part about that is that they've outlasted most of the bonds that are _supposed_ to be there. Like the bonds between parents and their kids." The blond paused. "Jeez. I have the most round about way of going through conversations, don't I?"

"Yes." Kakashi, Sasuke, and Sakura responded automatically.

Naruto noted them almost absently, and he was halfway engulfed in his own swirling thoughts as he continued. "You have to think about it from your son's point of view, Takuo. I mean, if he finds out that you're, you know, worshiping me, he'll probably be both creeped out and pretty pissed off by it. He's only a few years younger than me, he's probably better than me a dozen times over in everything _but_ math (and only narrowly there), and yet you spend more time licking the dirt off my feet than with him playing catch, or rescuing cats from trees, or doing whatever the hell office people do in their spare time." He felt a delayed shudder from horrible mental imagery course through him, and he saw Sakura cringe nearby. Sasuke's eyebrows furrowed, but his nose was scrunched as if he'd smelled something awful.

He scratched at the edge of his nose for an instant then shook his head. "You know, with my luck, your kid's going to be the most incredible ninja in his entire generation. He'll have a secret bloodline where he can make things explode with his mind, or something, and he'll have a vendetta against me because of all this." He sighed. "So, there it is." He had to force Takuo to meet his eyes, shifting his posture and raising his chest until, in the end, he had to resort to raising his killing intent slightly to get the other shinobi to react. Takuo, however, looked so nervous that, after a moment, Naruto dropped the aura down and sighed.

"Okay. You've heard that old saying about breaking eggs to make an omelet?" Takuo, a scattering of fans, and Sakura nodded. Sasuke looked stony, but Naruto felt the weight of the other boy's attention on his shoulders. Somehow, it weighed even more than Sarutobi's did on his most impressive days. "You've never had ramen omelets."

There was not so much a pause as an absence of noise. "W-what?" Naruto couldn't tell who, or frankly, "what" spoke.

"See, you cook ramen until it's all soft, right? Then, you squish the noodles down in the pan and then after you flip it for a while, put your cheese and vegetables in there." He stretched out his hands. "No eggs."

Takuo swallowed. It was clearly difficult for the admin-nin, and Naruto patiently waited until the other shinobi was composed enough to speak. "I don't understand, Uzumaki-sama. Eggs?"

"Eggs are a metaphor. Or a simile." Naruto stated firmly. "I found out what those were the other day. Actually, they sound pretty cool." He shook his head. "Your son is an egg. The bond you have with your kid? An egg. Hell, Konoha is it's own egg. A huge egg filled with ...ew, would this whole village be mold or something?"

Kakashi pressed two fingers to the bridge of his nose, and Naruto froze for a moment. He had to wonder if the jonin could somehow know about how much he resembled Glasses in that instant. The same expression of weariness (tinted with a tolerable amount of disdain) was mixed with equal parts frustration. "Didn't you have a topic a few days ago, Naruto?"

"Ah, right!" A quick shake sent his blond hair flying. "I don't want to be your hero if it means breaking your eggs, Takuo." He paused. "If becoming the Hokage is like making an omelet, breaking eggs as I go? I'm just going to make ramen omelets instead. No broken eggs. No broken bonds." Later, Naruto wouldn't be able to definitively say if he was subconsciously pulling on killing intent, but he couldn't find any other explanation for why, as one, the admin-nin seemed to sway back as if pushed by a very large gust of wind.

"It's not the way it's been done. Yeah, I get that." He smirked, and the smile stolen from Glasses (and the borrowed arrogance attached to it) fit in him awkwardly. "I made a promise that I would find my own way of the ninja. Not just for myself, you know? I know what being the Hokage means. I know that it's more than my dream - it's more than my destiny right now, too. My 'nindo' leads straight to Hokage. I could've been born female, purple, or with wings, and in every single one of those really weird universes, I'd _still_become Hokage." He stopped. "Even if I were a duck."

Sakura opened her mouth. She inhaled. She moved her lips and, as soon as her eyes closed, sagged as if she were filled with air and poked with a pin. Slowly, she shook her head, glancing towards Kakashi with what Naruto would later decide was a "plea for help".

"Anyway, guys." He continued, stretching out his hands towards the admin-nin who watched them with the same instincts as all shinobi of any worth, "You have children. Parents. Pet parrots. Witty back-and-forth exchanges with the guy who delivers your milk. I can't say I know that for all of you, but at least _one_ of you has to have a life outside of work. Right?" The admin-nin glanced at the walls, the ceilings, the floors, and the large array of statues collected on the shelves. "...Anyway," he emphasized, "If you were to," he shuddered, "pull the whole 'obsessed mob' thing with me like girls from age seven to seventeen pull on Sasuke just for the whole SAP thing, not only would I be creeped out (and rightfully so, I think), but I think I'd be disappointed in you."

Takuo gasped, his eyes watering as his cupped his hands beneath his chin, glancing down at the genin with what could've been an entirely moving expression had Takuo been thirty years younger, female, and remotely attractive. "Disappointed in _us_, Uzumaki-sama?"

Naruto nodded. "If you were to follow me blindly and forget all the bonds you've made over the years - your family, your friends, your milkmen - you'd be working against the very principle which has united Konoha since it's foundation." He felt the word escape his lips before he even knew what it meant, and spent a moment afterwards letting it sift through his mind. "Bonds."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

Naruto scowled at the dark-haired boy, and the familiar action was calming. It reminded him of calmer states of mind, and it was with a lighter tone that he continued. "Konoha, more than any other Hidden Village, relies on and emphasizes teams, families, and clans. We're paired together because of strengths and weaknesses that are helped and negated by those around us, and yes, Kakashi-sensei, I'm pretty sure I know what 'negated' means."

The silver-haired man flipped through the pages of his book lazily, but the way that his finger kept lingering at each page's edge showed that his mind was a thousand miles away.

"It's _because_ of those bonds that Konoha is strong. It's because of those bonds that Konoha will be even stronger when I'm Hokage. But, if you just cut off all your bonds, and you convince everyone around you to do the same?" He forced his eyes to bore into Takuo's, noting for the first time that the man had green eyes, and that they somehow tugged strands of memory at the edges of his mind. "We're boned."

"But your deeds, Uzumaki-sama!" Takuo protested. Several of the admin-nin behind him nodded enthusiastically, but a large number of them seemed frozen within their own thoughts. "Organizing BIRCH? Cleaning SAP? Finding WB-247? Within our profession, those are monumental tasks which _deserve_ praise."

Naruto waved Takuo off. "Listen. The last thing I need right now is a fan base. Fans just _beg_ to be used. The fact that Sasuke is too much of a stuck-up, arrogant bastard to actually give his stalkers the time of day is actually one of his redeeming characteristics."

Oddly, Sasuke did not seem pleased by this praise.

"It's creepy as hell having someone's complete and utter devotion, you know? It's a powerful thing, and if ninjutsu's taught me one lesson after all this time, it's that and powerful things have the habit of blowing up in your face later down the line." He paused. "Besides," he spoke, his tone lowering as his own thoughts cycled through the treacherous wasteland inside of his mind, "I don't want fans who I want to punch in the face, you know? People who have something good and just dismiss it like it's nothing? They really, really piss me off."

For a moment, Takuo was still. His eyelids began to flicker, and for a rather traumatizing moment, Naruto was frozen by the possibility that the admin-nin was crying, and then with the fact that, as he'd caused it, it was his responsibility to stop it.

"Comrades," Naruto tried to say lightly, moderately succeeding, "I'd love to have some of those. Friends would be even better, but even _I_ know when a bar is set too high. I don't need fans. Hell, Sasuke might, so you can just go over and ask him about it. As much as I can appreciate the occasional ego-stroking, I'd much rather have someone I _know_ won't..." He finished the sentence in his own mind and realized that it tasted bitter. He shook his head. "You're a good guy, Takuo. Seriously. I've read your evaluation reports and even when you were an apprentice, you were damn good at what you did. So, I'll cut you a deal. The day I clean SAP or the day I become Hokage - which ever comes first -you can start calling me 'sama' again." He grimaced. "If you must."

Kakashi wiped his brow with a careless hand. "Thank god. Even in the worst case scenario, we still have another twenty years."

Sasuke nodded briskly and Sakura sagged in relief. "I thought I was going to go insane." Naruto started at her hitai-ate until she glanced up curiously. "What's wrong?"

Naruto shook his head. "You can't honestly think that it'll take me twenty years to become Hokage, right?"

Sasuke snorted. "We weren't talking about you becoming the Hokage. That's in the _best_ case scenario, which should give us another fifteen after that."

Naruto struggled to work out the math in his head and, loathe to pull out his fingers again, simply settled on shaking his head, sighing deeply. "You said you found papers about my parentage?"

Takuo's eyes had been closed for the longest few minutes, and Naruto half wondered if the admin-nin was sleeping or, on the other side of the spectrum, dead. It took a moment, but Takuo's eyelids began to flutter, and he finally opened his eyes to connect with Naruto's gaze.

The oddest look of wonder passed over the middle-aged shinobi's face, and Naruto felt a sense of foreboding sweep over him.

The green-eyed man blinked for another moment, rubbed his cheeks with one hand to try to remove some of his flush, and nodded. "I admit that it still could be classified in the 5t-iY(r) category of paperwork, but for some reason, the classification grade itself was at least Admin-nin Level B."

Sakura's voice was faint. "I can't believe that I only understood a third of that."

Naruto's ears twitched, and he realized that the fact that he understood _all_ of that to be a sign of both incoming madness and a long, relaxing trip to Ichiraku's in the near future. "Well, because of my current assignment, I have provisional shinobi Rank B, with an equivalent Admin-nin Rank of... Wait, that can't be right..." Naruto counted out on his fingers before he could remind himself not to, tried to hide his horror and shock, and repeated the process roughly five times before Takuo shook his head.

"No, you are, as always, correct, Uzumaki-sa-" Takuo left the honorific stretch out as his own features registered shock. "...-san. Uzumaki-san."

Naruto left out a breath of relief he hadn't realized he'd been holding. Most likely, he'd been holding it since the first time the Hokage's Secretary called him that. "But, the only other Admin-nin A-rank I've heard about are the Hokage, because he's pretty much an honorary 'everything,' Nara Shikaku, and you." He stopped. "Why the _hell_ is Shikamaru's father rated A-rank?"

One of the admin-nin behind Takuo shook his head, and Naruto wasn't just surprised to find that no face in the crowd was scowling at him, and most faces were still in between something like (ever-foreboding) wonder and awe. "I can recall that day, Uzumaki-san." The last syllable was emphasized, and Naruto suddenly realized that "san" might have well have just been a codeword for "sama" with the way the shinobi was saying it, time line or no. "It involved one of the weekly jonin poker games, a liberal application of unfortunate inebriants, and an ill-timed bet."

Sakura spoke up. "So, wait. Takuo-san is on the same level as the Hokage? What exactly is it that you do?"

The admin-nin blinked, biting at the upper part of his lip for a moment as if trapped in his own thoughts. "Sakaru, was it?"

The kunoichi sighed. "I have a feeling that's as close as it will ever get, yes."

Takuo could've pre-packaged indifference and sold it for thousands of dollars to rich aristocrats around the world because while he had to have heard her (being about four feet away from her), and had to have had interest in it (as he had _asked_ her about it), he continued on with an easy smile and a slight nod. "Ah yes, Rusaku," he spoke in a gentle tone which made Sakura's battle aura spike and Naruto deftly move a few more inches to his side when no one was paying attention to him. "_I_," he started with what could only be called pompous pride, "am the shinobi trusted by the Hokage himself to process and expedite the flow of information within Konohagakure. It is a high post, one which I have been so privileged to take from my father, and my father from his, and _his_ father from..."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "If I could pry, 'Takuo-san,'" The jonin started lightly, "Could I ask if your reign has been called an improvement over your predecessor's?"

A wide grin broke over the elder shinobi's face. "Oh my, yes. In this past decade, I've managed to cut the amount of paperwork needed for acquisition requests and departmental transfers by fifty percent!"

Naruto froze. "So, those fifteen-page documents I had to fill out yesterday... those were _shorter_ than they used to be?"

Takuo nodded merrily. "While my grandfather and father believed that enemy shinobi would reveal the contradictions in their cover stories through intensive paperwork, I came to the conclusion early on in my admin-nin career that, frankly, those born and raised in Konoha were more likely to fill out paperwork than any foe. No Konoha citizen deserves to fill out fifty pages of paperwork to claim their own house."

Naruto nodded. "Damn right." He nodded, and the divine light of inspiration burst through the ceiling and illuminated him in burning comprehension. It was _extremely_ painful, especially for the part of his brain that picked facts and tidbits up quicker than the rest of him. "Your father ran your department about, oh, fifteen or ten years ago?"

The light caught some particularly greasy strands of Takuo's comb-over, and the ninja nervously slicked them back. "Yes. I only came into this role seven years, eight months, and five weeks ago." He turned his head slightly to glance at the ceiling. "Not, of course, that I'm counting."

"Of course," Naruto responded. He sagged until he thought his knees would bend from his own weight, then pulled himself upright with the edge of a nearby shelf. His masculinity was assured when he decided_not_ to fall bonelessly onto it and cry, and instead, he sighed. "Figures."

Sasuke inhaled. "Ah." Naruto realized that the world would shortly come to an end when _Sasuke_ sent him a look of _sympathy_. The blond awaited the arrival of the apocalypse with the knowledge that the odds were generally fifty/fifty that he was going to a better place, and either way, he'd see either his relatives or his teammates. "SAP - the archival graveyard - is around a decade old, isn't it?"

Nodding his head, Naruto didn't even flinch as he hit the underside of the shelf with a loud, metallic ring. "Spot on." He heaved his chest, only barely registering that he was breathing while he did so. Eventually, he forced his head up out of its divot and glanced at Kakashi. "Sensei, are you done yet? Can we leave here?" Naruto turned towards Takuo. "I'm sorry about, you know, the whole 'insulting your way of life' thing earlier."

Takuo didn't, as Naruto expected, scowl, furrow his brow, or huff off in an indignant rage as Naruto's previous remarks finally sank in. Instead, he bowed. "You are on the glorious quest to clean SAP. This fact alone makes you worthy of praise. But, to denounce praise as wasteful, and to ask us to devote our energies towards the betterment of Konoha?" Takuo smiled. "I hope you finish SAP quickly, 'Uzumaki-san', so that I can grant you the respect you deserve."

Naruto's lips were completely useless as they fumbled against each other, his tongue mutinying against all other occupants of his mouth as words were rendered completely unintelligible. He weakly shook his head in protest.

Takuo glanced at the group of admin-nin behind him. A taller individual in the back, startled at his gaze, took one last drink of Naruto's appearance, then reluctantly left. Others followed in much the same manner, though some were bold enough to grab Naruto's hand (which had been stuck in limbo between reaching after Takuo and smashing through the floor), and others still gave the blond promises of dinner invitations, tutelage and, oddly enough, daughters. Naruto didn't quite comprehend why _they_ were offered, but the twitch of Kakashi's eyebrow surely meant it couldn't be anything good.

There was a long, deep, and resonating silence. Even Naruto, who usually was the one to replace such echoing nothingness with his own version of cheerful chatter, was rendered helpless. Eventually, he turned towards Kakashi. "That didn't work out the way I wanted it to, did it?"

Kakashi rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Was your intent to make your fan base even more devoted to you than they were before?"

Naruto sighed deeply. "Dammit."

Sasuke leaned against one rack of shelving. "Idiot," he began, waiting until Naruto turned before continuing, "How is it that you can insult someone's belief system, occupation, intelligence level, and personal life and still manage to have them slavishly loyal to you?"

Naruto heaved his shoulders and spread his hands. "It's a gift?"

* * *

"So," Sakura began with what could only ever be called an "evil" smirk, "What did it look like?" 

Naruto hesitated, twisting his head to look at her while his foot nearly fumbled on the cobblestone street, splashing his pants up to his thighs with murky water from the infinite supply of nearby puddles. "What did _what_ look like?"

"You know," she started, and lowered her voice so much that she leaned in closely. Their umbrellas bumped together and Sasuke, between them, shot both of them irritated looks as water cascaded between the cracks. _Somehow_, the Uchiha's umbrella had been rendered inoperable, and the prodigy was forced into the choice between standing under Naruto's and facing merciless teasing on all available future occasions, standing under Sakura's and facing the brunt of what Naruto knew to be her fan girl whiles, or standing between the two of them, getting a healthy dosing of both options _and_ a rather unhealthy dosing of rain. "The Hokage's chest. Was it covered in scars, or does he have a really impressive tattoo? There are rumors that he knows a technique so deadly that the only copy of it is on his own skin."

Naruto really _did_ stumble. "Oh god." He felt something like horror pool in his throat, and it tasted acidic. "Unless it's the secret technique of making me completely lose my appetite, there wasn't anything on his skin." He shuddered again. "Oh, god._ Memories_."

Sasuke glanced at both of them, and Naruto could see something like resignation on his features, almost hidden by the same disgust Naruto knew was plastered on his face (though, he was equally sure that it had creeped down to his fingers and toes, and that if there was a shinobi art of Knee Reading, there would be no doubt that Naruto had seen horrible, horrible things). "Sakura," he began, making the pink haired girl jerk her head up so quickly that Naruto thought she'd get whiplash, "didn't you say that he'd already been tortured enough?"

Sakura wagged a finger. "Actually, no. I just said that I couldn't do anything to him worse than that. I might've even said that I forgave him. However, I _never_ said that I would let it go."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "That's not the meaning of 'forgiving him?'"

Sakura scoffed. "Of course not. Those are two entirely different concepts, sensei."

Naruto frowned. "Sakura, why are you so mean to me? I don't think I could get _ramen_ down now." He resisted the urge to pout. "You know, Makoto made this lunch for me, and I didn't want to waste it."

Sasuke glanced back to Sakura. "You are..." he trailed off, something like approval in his eye. He cut off with a small, satisfied noise that couldn't been a chuckle before focusing back on their teacher's lazy footsteps. "I suppose," Sasuke commented distantly, "that if you're not going to eat it, and you don't want to hurt Makoto's feelings by letting it sit untouched, it would be best for all parties to give it to someone else."

Naruto narrowed his eyes. "Oh, you malicious bastards." He paused. "Except you, Sakura-chan." He glanced at her. "You're just evil."

Sakura smiled. "And hungry!"

Despite the fact that he had the ability to travel in a cloud of smoke (or, as shown by one of Maito's Gai's more traumatizing spontaneous entries, beams of lights and clouds of confetti), Naruto had steadily gathered the evidence to support the fact that Kakashi Hatake just enjoyed shocking people. "Ah," the masked man stated, causing Sakura's shoulders to jerk backwards as her posture straightened, flinging water off the edge of her umbrella onto Sasuke. "Well, this seems just as good a time as any to scout out that new cafe, then."

Sakura glanced at Sasuke, who glanced at Naruto's bag with a fierce, hungry intent the blond was positive Sakura would much rather be focused on her. "But, you really haven't tried Makoto's cooking, sensei..."

"Yet." The silver-haired man corrected with a wave of a finger. "None of you have been to a shinobi cafe, have you?"

The three genin glanced at each other, and Sakura and Naruto shook their heads, while Sasuke shook water off his head with a scowl. Naruto was reminded of a rather petulant cat.

A short, slick, and admittedly dangerous trip on the perilous Shinobi Highway led them to a small brick building which sat snuggly between a weapon store whose owner had once hurled kunai at a young Naruto and what looked like an abandoned civilian residence. It had a large window in the front which gave view to a small collection of tables situated randomly around the room, a rather overworked, plain looking waitress, and what looked like a ornate tapestry of a forest scene.

Kakashi glanced at the building with an appraising eye, and Naruto had to tilt back his umbrella and cover his eyes to make out the small, neatly written shinobi symbols between the roof overhang and the shadowed brick underneath it. "Good food" was one, while "cute waitress" was written in broader script. He had to use the fox to focus on a small line written in what looked like chalk, and even then he couldn't make out the third symbol from the right, which looked something like a spatula with lines above and below it.

Sakura gasped. "Oh! That's the symbol for Cooking-nin, right Kakashi-sensei?"

Naruto twisted his head to glance at the kunoichi. "What are cooking-nin? How come I've never heard of them before?"

"Finally," Sasuke muttered, "something you _don't_ know, idiot."

"Oh, like you have a clue either, bastard." Naruto growled for a moment, then stood up straighter, his shoulders flexing and just _coincidently_ forcing his umbrella to drip onto the dark-haired boy.

"I've read about them before." Sakura began after a short pause with involved a painful attraction between the handle of her umbrella and Naruto's gut, "But, I didn't think that there were any left in Konoha."

Kakashi made a small noise to himself. "Look at the dark shape in the shadows above the window, fifth brick from the right edge."

Sakura squinted. "Oh! That's the sign for the Hidden Village of the Cloud, right? But, what does that accent point mean?"

"The reverse comma mark," Kakashi taught (to the shock and awe of all nearby), "normally indicates banishment, but as you can see, there are two of them opposing each other. That indicates that these cooking-nin left voluntarily, with the support of his or her village. Of course, that only applies for Cloud. If you saw the opposing comma accents on the symbol for Sand, it indicates that there's a lovely looking lady looking for adventure waiting just inside."

Naruto paused. "Adventure how?"

Kakashi smiled. "Ah, well you see, Naruto-ku-"

The jonin didn't get to complete his sentence as a small group of cold, wet ANBU who resonated misery leaped down onto the street. This both confused and irritated Naruto, as the only nearby leaping points were tin roofs and flat one-story rooftops, and in either case, he should've been able to spot them sometime before they landed directly in front of him.

Naruto recognized the leader of the group as Boar, and very slowly inched away.

"Hatake Kakashi." ANBU had to have special training in making their voices seem menacing even when doing menial tasks. If Boar was asked to read out her grocery list, Naruto had the feeling that it would make civilians and shinobi alike cry out in horror and duck into their houses in fright. "This is your first official warning."

The jonin raised an eyebrow. "About?"

Naruto suddenly felt as if a thousand senbon were pricking at his brain. That wasn't to say that it hurt, but rather that all parts of his brain seemed to call for attention, and the blond had to concentrate in order to focus all his attention on Boar. He was surprised that it_did _actually help him. "Wait..." he began, raising one eyebrow at the ANBU, "you can't honestly mean that the law was passed _that_ quickly, right?"

Boar stood straight at attention, her chest hoisted high as one arm was clasped behind her back, the other (predictably) inches away from her kunai pouch. "As it turns out, the bill had been drafted some period of time ago, and only required a few changes to make it current."

Sakura stepped forward, and while she didn't draw back as all ANBU whipped their stony gazes to her, she did speak with the same reserved, careful tone and sentence structure that Naruto had almost forgotten about. "ANBU-san," she began, "is it in our rights to know about this law Naruto mentioned?"

Naruto scratched the back of his head. "Hell, I could tell you that one, Sakura-chan. You know, in exchange for a date."

The ANBU politely glanced away as he lifted himself from the street, but Kakashi, (as evil as he was), merely raised his eyebrow at his student before focusing back on the other group of shinobi. "Boar-san," he stated, and somehow Naruto thought the suffix was completely alien on Kakashi's tongue, "this new law?" It was a leading question, and before the Kyuubi-vessel could answer, Boar nodded her head, her tone succinct.

"It is a deviation from Jiraiya's Law." Naruto itched at the back of his brain, but couldn't dig away the idea that he'd heard that name somewhere before. It linked up to fragmented images and memories, and he assumed that they were incomplete pictures from when he'd first organized BIRCH, and had a horrible case of Info Overflow.

Kakashi, however, went still. "You can't mean..."

Boar nodded. "The Hokage submitted the changes today, and it was accepted unanimously."

Naruto scrunched up his eyebrows. "Who the hell is this Jiraiya guy, and why would his law be like Kakashi-sensei's?" Sakura bored into the back of his head (if not with her fists, then definitely with her eyes), and he turned his head towards her. "See, as far as I knew, the old coot made up the law today, after the whole 'Hooker' thing."

Sasuke might've paled, but it was rather hard to tell. His voice might've been a bit more high pitched than normal, however, as his head moved to catch Naruto's gaze. The blond, by this time, was coming to the realization that, if his attention kept being volleyed, his neck would twist so much his head would fly off into the far distance. In an easy movement, Naruto turned to face his team, his back open towards Boar. "_Hookers_?" It was barely more than a whisper, but Naruto decided that hearing that almost-panicked, breathless tone out of _Sasuke's_ lips was enough to throw the rest of his day (if not week, month, or lifetime) into uncertainty.

"Well, yeah. See, I asked ...this nice lady I met who sometimes waters my plants when I'm on missions about some things earlier today. Hookers were just one of them." At about the same time that Naruto realized he really needed to find and settle on a better, non-incriminating description of Makoto, Kakashi and Sasuke shared a wide-eyed, horrified gaze. From his new angle, Naruto watched (with growing unease of his own) Sakura's pupils shrink until they were completely surrounded with white.

"You asked your... nice lady who waters your plants while you're away," her verbal stumble was quickly followed by Naruto's quick title, but the way she kept inhaling sharply before difficult syllables added merit to the idea that the hesitation was just a breath, "about _hookers_? _Again?" _She shook her head violently, and Naruto decided it was a prelude as to what she would do to him at the earliest available opportunity.

Cautiously, Naruto nodded. "Well, not about hookers, really. I mean, we _did _talk about hookers, but that was the night before. It was actually about that whole 'katana and sheath' thing you were talking about yesterday, sensei."

Kakashi stared the ANBU, who seemed to be glaring, fingers inching ever closer to a large range of hidden, pointy objects, straight in the mask. "I can't be punished retroactively for breaking a law just put in place."

One of the ANBU behind Boar shifted, and the kunoichi nodded briskly. "Yes. Tread carefully with your words, Hatake Kakashi."

A sudden surge of irritation washed through Naruto. "Then, the old coot Hokage wouldn't tell me about how the hell hookers relate to sex, or about the whole 'babies' thing."

Boar stiffened again, and Naruto wished that he had more than an instant to try to figure out if she was hiding a laugh or not. As it was, he only had a few seconds before Sakura stumbled back as if struck.

"B-babies?" Her tone was weak, sickly, meek, and so unlike how Naruto perceived Sakura to be that he actually screened his words before speaking.

"Yeah. I asked him where the hell they came from. I mean, my guess is 'hookers,' because that's where I was always told I came from as a kid, but Sarutobi seemed pretty freaked out about it. He said something about a class - don't get your panties in a bunch, Sasuke, because it's not like I actually want to go _back_to school again, you know - and then, well, the whole law thing."

Kakashi brought two fingers to rest against his temple. For a moment, he shifted his head as if he was going to speak and, despite the fact that the man's mouth was masked, Naruto had the notion that he was mutely trying, and failing, to form words. One moment stretched into one second, and one second dragged on until it reached one minute, and then finally, Naruto couldn't mask the sense of irritation that_he_ felt, and caught Sakura's gaze.

"Eh, yeah." He started carelessly. "I guess we can go out on a date later on. I mean, hell, this probably cancels out a favor I owed you or something." He paused. "You know, I'm not even sure why you'd want to know this. But, well, Kakashi's Law?" The masked man jerked his head, one hand out stretched towards Naruto in a desperate, unspoken plea, "I'm pretty sure it prohibits Kakashi from being a pervert where we can see it."

Kakashi sagged, his hand falling limply to his side as his shoulders hunched. With a suffering sigh, he gathered himself into a slouch, his head hanging so low that it looked like his chin was digging through his chest.

Sakura, however, pumped her fist in the air. "_Finally_".

Sasuke, beside her, brought one hand to his forehead, and the dark-haired boy either couldn't hide or didn't even try to disguise the small, relieved small creeping up on his face. "Oh, thank _god."_

Boar's head straightened up, her shoulders arching backwards as she undoubtedly raised an eyebrow behind her mask. "I admit that those were not expected reactions."

Sakura turned towards the female ANBU. "You haven't been around him enough then." She paused. "Actually, that might be a good thing."

Naruto wondered just how good the Fox's eyes were getting because, despite the layers of spandex, Naruto could make out Kakashi's pout. "It's not that bad. Most genin your age would be jumping at the chance to learn..." He trailed off as Boar-san stared at him, "what I'm not allowed to teach you anymore."

Sasuke grunted. "Kakashi-sensei," he began carefully, and Naruto wondered exactly when _every_honorific sounded alien coming from Sasuke's lips, "Remember for a moment all of the things you've been 'teaching' us." The silver haired man paused for a moment; head cocking to the side. Sasuke leaned forward only slightly, his eyes narrowing as he spoke slower and softer. "Now, imagine what would happen if we actually took your lessons to heart."

Shinobi were supposed to be emotionless tools. Hatake Kakashi was a very good shinobi. However, in the past few days, Naruto had seen more emotion cross his face than he'd seen on the jonin's face in all the previous months combined. The Kyuubi-vessel believed on each and every occasion that that would be the end of it all; either the world would end, or Hatake Kakashi would run out of his emotion allotment for the year and become much the same as he had been prior.

Hatake Kakashi looked scared.

In fact, "scared" was putting it mildly. The catatonia of the previous evening's variety of revelations seemed like a passing phase compared to the way that even the tiniest joints of Kakashi's fingers froze in place. His eyes moved before his lips, and Naruto wondered just how long jonin could hold their breath for, as Kakashi's lips seemed sealed by stone.

Kakashi's eye widened until his pupil seemed no larger than a pinprick. "M-my god." He whispered. "I nearly...?" The Fox struggled to hear the rest of Kakashi's plea, but the ANBU near him shot a look at Sasuke, who craned his head slightly.

"You_ nearly_, yes. But, it was caught in time." For some reason, the dark haired boy caught Naruto's eyes.

Naruto frowned. "Wait, why are you guys all looking at me? And seriously, what lessons could we have heard from Kakashi's porn? I mean there aren't even any fight scenes in them! Well, okay, on that camping trip, he did read part of that scene where that one chick with the," Naruto gestured at his hair for a moment before Kakashi's eye widened slightly.

"Yuri." He supplied.

Naruto nodded. "Right, Yuri. Anyway, I remember that she was fighting against that other girl with the," he paused, "the eye thing, right?"

Kakashi slowly brought one hand to his temple. "Riri." He seemed to be in a great deal of pain.

"Right! Yeah. Anyway, I'm _pretty_ sure they were fighting. I mean, there did seem to be a lot of tears in their clothing, and I know that happens an awful lot in ninja fights, and..." He stopped. "Sasuke, why are you looking at me like that?"

"When did you say that you were going to this 'class' Sarutobi recommended, idiot?" Sasuke's arms were crossed over his chest, his legs rigidly together as he used his hair to cast shadows over his face. The dramatic effect was ruined by the fact that, in all the confrontation, both Sakura and Naruto himself had moved away from the Uchiha, leaving the genin unprotected from the water. The boy's hair drooped in front of his face, and Naruto was actually disappointed that the Uchiha's perfectly pale complexion didn't melt off his face in a wave of dripping cosmetics.

Naruto rubbed at his chin for a second, searching deep at the inner parts of his memory. It was a treacherous trip, as there were so very many things about that occasion which he never, ever hoped to recall again in all the rest of his lifetime. "I don't think he said anything about when. I'm pretty sure he said he needed to pull some strings to get me in there, or something." He paused. "Why?"

Sakura's expression betrayed her. Naruto wondered just when it started to resent her, as it had steadily revealed all of Sakura's small tics and tells long before the first time he'd worked up the nerve to ask her for ramen and gotten smacked for his efforts. "Sasuke-kun," she murmured. The prodigy turned towards her. "You don't think that this 'class' is...?"

Sasuke nodded. "The timing would work. Chakra control? The idiot's 'special education?' Where else - or, really, 'how' else - in Konoha could he learn it?"

Sakura's face was slack for a moment before her jaw began to lower. Her eyes seemed to water for the briefest of moments before her hand moved to cover first her trembling lips and jaw line, then her eyes and the edge of her forehead. "Oh." She muttered. Her hand came down to cup her mouth again, doing nothing to hide the size of her eyes. "Oh."

Naruto put his hands on his hips. "Okay, spill, or I'm going to have to beat it out of you, Sasuke."

The dark-haired boy lifted his chin in defiance of Naruto's killing intent. "You had the opportunity to learn about it at the academy. Your ignorance is your own fault, caused by your own impulsive actions." He paused, and Naruto saw something flicker across Sasuke's face for a shinobi-moment. It looked _exactly_ like relief. "Thank god."

Just as Naruto tried to twist Sasuke's words inside of his own head, Boar made a sound within her throat. "Hatake Kakashi," she addressed, turning stiffly towards the jonin, "this has been your first warning, and as such, will not be marked on disciplinary records, performance reviews, or the council's weekly report."

Naruto glanced up, and his attention finally was pulled to the world of the present after he smacked his forehead against the metal bars of his umbrella with a half-heartedly muffled curse. "Ow. Dammit. Sakura-chan, what daily report is she talking about?"

The kunoichi glanced at him for a moment before she placed her finger under her chin. "I believe I've heard about it from Ino. Er, I mean, 'Ino-pig.'" She amended hastily. "Her father's the head of their family, and when he's forced to, he can attend the council's weekly meeting. I believe that it's a summary of the week's observations, usually collected from council watchmen placed through the village or through the eyes of the council members themselves."

Sasuke rumbled, his voice catching in this throat for a few syllables before Naruto (reluctantly) let the Fox control his hearing. "Usually", he began slowly, "it's used for blackmail purposes. Some of the larger clans have or," there was a minuscule pause, "had members of the family devoted solely to policing and observing members of that same clan. The council's reports were meant to put the other major families of Konoha on a relatively equal footing with each other. If every family has blackmail on the others, it puts them all at a relatively equal level."

For a single instant, Naruto was going to ask Sasuke exactly how he knew something which not just Naruto, but most of his generation considered to be a very obscure fact. Then, he caught sight of the rolling, billowing battle aura boiling behind Sasuke like pillars of black smoke, and he decided that death would be a very bad career move for a shinobi with high ambitions.

He scratched at the back of his head. "Hey, Boar-san? Are you hungry? We're having lunch soon. Well, I know Sakura is, because she's pretty evil, but I'm not sure how hungry Sasuke will be after he starts picturing old man Sarutobi topless and soaked with sweat."

Uchiha Sasuke didn't _precisely_ pale, as he already had slightly less color than a snow bank. Instead, Naruto could tell he'd struck not just a nerve, but solid gold as the dark-haired boy's pupils contracted. "You...you..." Sasuke clenched one fist against his leg, two inches too close to his kunai pouch for Naruto's liking (or well-being). "It wasn't enough that you made me miss lunch yesterday, was it?"

Naruto frowned. "What are you talking about? Makoto's lunch, remember? You pigged out, and don't dare try to deny it."

Sasuke leveled Naruto with a glare so fierce that it, in itself, should've been graded at least a C-rank technique. "Yes, it tasted very good the _first_ time. The return trip? Not quite as enjoyable." The Uchiha shivered, and Naruto had the feeling that it wasn't from the weather. "Nor were the circumstances."

Sakura gasped, and she sounded struck with such sudden understanding that Naruto turned towards her. He squinted to block out the bright light caught in every crevice of every store window, and it only took a moment for his expression to soften. "Sakura-chan, maybe you should get out of the cold? Your cheeks are red. Maybe you're coming down with something."

The kunoichi's hand shot to her cheeks in a swift motion. If she could throw shuriken that fast, all of Team Seven's missions would be over as soon as they got in sight range. Sakura ducked her head down for a moment while Kakashi looked politely away, Sasuke's irritation and disgust battled for supremacy, and the ANBU looked, for lack of a better word, bored.

Sasuke glanced towards the ANBU after another moment passed, and it became evident that Sakura wouldn't speak. "Shouldn't you be filled with horror, indignation, and murderous rage at the fact that the idiot spoke of the Hokage in such a way?"

Boar turned towards Sasuke and, though her voice was low, it carried through the rain and seemed to vibrate the cobblestones. "ANBU have seen many things. _Horrible_ things."

Naruto crossed his arms in front of his chest and tapped one finger against his arm for a moment. He nodded firmly to himself then pointed at Boar. "You were one of the guards on his beach trip."

"_Horrible things_" Boar repeated. One of the ANBU behind her actually shuddered, and Naruto turned back to Sasuke.

"If you think Sarutobi's chest is bad, try to imagine the fact that an ANBU needs to be able to watch the Hokage _all the time_ in foreign territory." He shot a pitying look at Boar. "Including the dressing room."

Kakashi covered his hitai-ate over his Sharingan eye with one hand as if an arrow had been shot dead in the center of it. The color on Sakura's cheeks (obviously caused by the occasional biting winds) faded in an instant as her entire complexion paled. She glanced at the ANBU with horror, and Boar nodded curtly in her direction. Naruto's attention, however, was focused on Sasuke as he growled, his eyes narrowing as he spat like a particularly venomous, particularly wet cat. "I _hate_ you, Uzumaki."

* * *

A/N: Whew. Okay, finally got to publish this chapter. Remove your hits on me right now, or I won't get to finish chapter 15. I'm already about 7K into that one, so it shouldn't be too far off. I'm twisting the rules of November around a bit and I'm doing this for my NaNoWriMo. 

Expect strange things.

Also, I have a new beta! He terrified and intimidated me the very first time we met, and I just want to give him huge loads of credit for knowing things in Japanese which I don't even know about English.

At least one person asked if I was very drunk while writing this. I can say honestly that I drink no wine, but if you count soda as an inebriant, I'm a complete lush.

Again, thanks for everything. It's fantastic to know that people like reading this story as much as I enjoy reading theirs. Writing it hasn't always been what you'd call pleasant, but there have been moments of complete joy where the universe itself gives way to my words.

Enjoy!

Mysteri: Review V-chan's wonderful work or DIE.


	15. Of Dice and Men

Chapter 15

Naruto knew from the moment he'd signed the Ninja Academy entrance forms that life as a shinobi would be continually exciting. He never, however, expected there would be a day where falling face first into Old Man Sarutobi's naked chest was the least embarrassing event of his day.

The shinobi cafe really wasn't anything Naruto had expected. Generally, however, shinobi had existed as long as they had because of the fact that they were quite surprising. Frankly, there were few things _more_ surprising than a figure clad in black dropping down from the ceiling in the hallway as you plodded to get a glass of water in the middle of the night. The building seemed to hold true to that particular aspect of shinobi life, if nowhere else. The first floor of the building was exactly how it looked from the inside. Bright, yellow wood composed everything from the floor to the tables, and the smattering of customers across a few tables looked bored, while the waitresses - civilian, by their heavy footsteps and the way that their hands towards the knives on their plates and not knives hidden on their persons when Naruto's group moved in - generated disinterest and scorn in such quantities that Naruto wondered if Sasuke's family had ever influenced or possibly founded the restaurant business. The _second_ floor of the building made Naruto feel like an idiot, which wasn't entirely unusual but had been lacking lately. It was comforting, in a way, to see that things hadn't changed all that much.

It only took Sakura and Sasuke a few seconds to notice the first of a bounty of hidden clues in the tapestry any more seasoned shinobi could've spotted in the window. Creative navigation lead the genin group (as their Jonin managed to hit on three waitresses in point three seconds, successfully separating himself from his genin) to a dirty looking door with a sloppily written, ink spotted parchment which read "Beware the Leopard" half-hiding the civilian symbol for the women's restroom.

As shinobi with full warning they were entering a shinobi restaurant, the fact that it even took Sasuke a full minute to locate the trap door at the top of what turned out to be a janitor's closet showed that they were sorely out of practice. Naruto had recently become aware of Sakura's tendency to block out the outside world. Sasuke reveled in it. Naruto had developed it carefully over the years as a skill and hobby, something akin to the way some ninja tended bonsai trees. Combined, it did not bode well. The fact that they were able to dodge the barrage of blunted shuriken half-heartedly shooting from rather obvious slots in the wall soothed Naruto's ego in much the same way that hand lotion didn't quite put out a fire.

Worst of all was Kakashi's easy posture as he leaned against the wall in front of the exit. With a camera.

Suddenly, the red spot Naruto's cheek which _certainly_ didn't look like Sakura's hand print and the bruise on Sasuke's forehead which _did_ come from Naruto's elbow glowed radioactive in the natural light of the hallway. Naruto imagined that the three of them, panting in a mixture of furious indignation, fervid embarrassment, and mild claustrophobia, made for a rather incriminating photograph.

"You also could've used the exit down the hall, which led to the second floor balcony entrance." Kakashi started, deftly hiding the camera. "Welcome to the first restaurant designed for shinobi, by a planned by a civilian."

Naruto barely had time to raise an eyebrow before a loud poof and a cloud of smoke appeared in the hallway in front of them. Instead of the generally scentless displacement of air most ninja left behind in their kawamiri, this cloud reeked of sulfur and gunpowder. Crouched on the floor, the shortest, baldest, and all around ugliest man Naruto had ever seen waited until most of the smoke around him dissipated until he rose, quickly shifting into the worst mockery of taijutsu Naruto had seen since his first year gym class.

"Clad in the veil of the night, surrounded by mystery and intrigue, this fearsome ninja is here to bring you into the terrible world of shinobi!". The waiter had on a mismatch of black shinobi gear from different eras patch worked into something which, to a squinted civilian eye, _could've_ looked like a shinobi uniform. The shoulder guards were from a courier's uniform, while the kunai holster (currently occupied by several rolled up scrolls) was strapped the wrong way on the man's back. A small pair of hunter-nin boots weren't laced the right way, and it looked like the man was wearing a black gi instead of something functional for stealth. The waiter glanced up with eyes that seemed continually runny. "Oh, shinobi." The man sagged. "Never a civilian. Not _once _in all the months I've been here. What I wouldn't give to inspire terror and awe in _one_ person. But, nooo."

Kakashi stared at the ceiling. He seemed to be counting the knots in the wood. Naruto caught Sakura's eyes and shared a sense of deep shame. As the two in the group most likely to have the greatest amount of civilian experience, it was embarrassing to be by the waiter. It was much the same as being a fisherman unfortunate enough to bring fellow tradesmen home to a family who couldn't tell the difference between a trout and a catfish, and thought tuna lived in cans, much like hermit crabs.

Naruto knew from the conversation with his family the night before that sometimes, civilians had really strange ideas about ninja. Honestly, that wasn't something unexpected. Kakashi had been right when he'd said that ninja villages survived because they put up an air of mystery, though Konoha hid it's long list of regulations in traditions and well-ingrained "common sense" which made ideas like having blackout curtains and a passing knowledge in morse code common to every household. Naruto had the feel that if a civilian could survive in a ninja village, they honestly deserved an honorary ninja badge of their own.

The waiter continued. "Do you think I like this?" He gestured towards the jumpsuit which appeared snug at the waistline, and loose at the knees. "I attended the academy, you know. Didn't actually pass, though. Figures that's what put me here. It wouldn't be so bad if they'd actually listen to me when I try to explain that, frankly, throwing stars would be horrible cup-holders, and explosive notes shouldn't be used as decoration. I ask you, do you think they listen?"

Sakura nodded at him with a nervous but polite smile. Naruto kept glancing at the short man, cocking his head to the side. He tried to imagine the stocky, rather plump waiter as an academy student, but the images building in his head rippled as soon as they were examined closely.

Sasuke glared, and Naruto nearly cheered at the sight of it. It wasn't the mild glare he used on Kakashi-sensei, or even the harsher glare he used on Fan-girls. His eyes narrowed, his arms crossed, and even his lips pulled tight, nearly showing the edges of perfectly white teeth. "Get on with it."

If Naruto had issued an order like that, he would've been hit from at least three separate directions, possibly with weapons. As it was, the waiter stepped back, glancing nervously towards the adult in the group quickly.

"W-well," he stuttered, "if you insist. My manager's not going to like it, you know. Not showing people the proper introduction. 'Atmosphere', he said." Kakashi slowly pulled one eye down from the ceiling. "Y-yes!"

Kakashi held up one hand, counting off four fingers. "Take-in. Window-section. No smoking section." There was a pause. He deliberately didn't look at Sakura, which worked just as well as the young kunoichi was glancing at him more than enough for both parts of the non verbal argument. "Please."

Sakura quirked an eyebrow. "Sensei, I thought you said this was a restaurant designed for shinobi. Isn't smoking generally a bad idea for our active lifestyle? Who would be stupid enough to..." The pink-haired kunoichi trailed off, her eyes following the ninja passing by them closely enough that Sasuke pressed against the wall.

Naruto gave a little wave to Shikamaru, but knew the fellow genin well enough he expected nothing in return. Chouji, ever polite, took his hand out from his bag of chips, waving towards Naruto and flinging crumbs everywhere. Ino and Sakura locked gazes, and Naruto would've have been surprised if both had sprouted claws and gone for the jugular.

Asuma passed by with an absent nod for Kakashi and a lingering scan on Naruto. Somehow, the blond got the impression that ever since he'd made genin, his presence had actually begun registering on the jonin's radar. Years of doing laundry, gardening, and the occasional all-out spring cleaning horror fest had passed the strategist by easily. Asuma coughed quietly, distantly flicking ashes in a potted plant as he and his team jumped down the janitor's closet.

"Right." Sakura muttered.

"Sirs, and miss," the waiter lisped distinctly, "this way, please."

The walk seemed far longer than it realistically was, but that was the case with most horrifying scenes. Something about the waiter played against every stereotype of shinobi. The fact that, reflected in the waiter's face, some of them were actually true only made the awkward feeling between the waiter and the ninja worse. Sakura, despite whatever failings she had as an observer of the environment, was an excellent judge of people. Not, Naruto noted, of the people around her as much as the people who she only met with on a random schedule. Sakura was skilled in picking up details about people she'd never met before, storing them away, and then never being able to use those facts again. She had, because of this and because of the unusual personalities of her teammates, picked up the habit of carrying on any polite conversation which was needed to fill a silence before Naruto got the chance.

"You know," Sakura said sweetly, "I don't believe we've caught your name. What can we call you?"

The waiter stumbled. "No one's ever asked for my name before." Sakura, realizing that she had made a grave error, hung back a few steps. The waiter took no notice. "Sasuke." The short man lisped. "That's my name. Not that anyone cares, of course." He added.

There was a momentary silence as all ninja stopped. Naruto closed his eyes. He breathed in the scent-filled air, holding his breath for several seconds before exhaling deeply. Life, he decided, was good. Beside him, Sakura stood, trying and failing to find something to say. Her finger was raised limply, and she continued her efforts for several seconds before shaking her head and decidedly not glancing at her brunette teammate. Relishing in the moment, Naruto glanced at Kakashi. His sensei was in turn glancing at Uchiha Sasuke, whose hands were creeping towards his weapons pouches one second and slowly being pulled back from aforementioned kunai the next. When it came to Uchiha-civilian relations, Sasuke was proving himself to be the greatest diplomat in generations. If Naruto had half as much chakra control as Sasuke was showing willpower, the world would've known it's youngest Hokage five years ago.

The self-pronounced "Thathuke" continued on. "That's what this village needs more of - proper kunoichi, that is. Not seen but one in a fortnight what wasn't wearing a damn mess of fishnet. That's you, miss." He nodded towards the kunoichi who, even now, was twice as pink in face as she was in her hair. "Not that I don't respect those women all the same. Takes a damn amount of bravery to show skin like that. Even my own mother wouldn't be gutsy enough for that." He laughed to himself. "'Cept after a few drinks, of course."

No one else laughed. The situation had all the same inevitability of escalation as an exploding tag did of causing someone a great deal of trouble, if not pain.

Naruto was halfway done plotting the likely course of events (a combination of snide comments, angry protests, and violence which would end with collateral damage), when he was distracted by a mixture of smells. Well-spiced meat was seared in wide open grills by kindly looking, plump chefs. Some had to be civilians, and further stations were being managed by shinobi who definitely weren't part of the staff. The ceiling had perspective points and strategically placed mirrors, and the combination not only increased the areas where it was much easier to see who was coming, but also screwed with the perspective and thus landing judgment of anyone coming in from the skylight.

Though the rat-faced Sasuke was at the front of the group, Kakashi nudged his way to a booth designed for particularly paranoid ninja. It was a crescent in one corner of the room, surrounded on both sides by thick concrete that hurt the knuckles to even look at, with further jutting wall sections to provide extra cover. At least the mirrors across from the booth gave a lovely view of the grey, overcast horizon of Konoha's skyline.

"Well, let's see what we have to work with, shall we?" Kakashi asked, clapping his hands together. It only took a few seconds for the kyuubi-vessel to recognize his cue. Naruto shuffled through his courier's bag and bypassed lengths of wire, a few books, and a multitude of weapons created with the intent of really making someone irritated before coming to Makoto's packed lunch.

Five sandwiches, six pieces of fruit, a pack of mixed nuts, two bags of potato chips, a pack of crackers and a small section of cheese, a mighty container of mixed greens, two thermoses of soup (chicken corn soup and, oddly enough, miso), and a frozen container with a large serving of pasta were taken out before Kakashi's eyes began to twitch. Sasuke was already reaching towards a sandwich made of what could've been egg salad as Sakura's hands intercepted Naruto's in mid-air, deftly taking the first slice of chocolate cake to her part of the table. Naruto stuck the rest of his arm in the lunch bag, fishing around at the bottom until he drew out the other three slices of cake, a container of mixed fruit with three yogurts, and a smell helping of well-powdered pastries.

Sasuke glanced at his stunned counterpart-in-name with the same look of mild scorn he normally looked at Naruto with. To the waiter's credit, he didn't immediately begin to whimper. "We will require silverware, and a number of plates." Uchiha, Naruto thought briefly, had the inborn ability at making all requests sound like orders. He barked commands just as well as a seasoned veteran on the field of battle. "I believe that drinks will be the only thing necessary for you to attend to personally." Naruto caught Sasuke's gaze for a minute, and the dark-haired boy felt compelled to add "Three teas, and a small soda from the children's menu. Make sure to secure the lid tightly."

"Oh, you dick." Naruto growled. Sasuke countered with a dismissive snort and a a look which plainly read "This sandwich is far more interesting than you".

"Now, now," Kakashi chided half-heartedly. His hand easily fell into the well worn path down the jonin's chest, unbuttoning the snaps nearly instantly and drawing out _not_ the familiar orange book with the small caution symbol, but instead a symbol piece of paper which had, in plain characters and bold text, "NO". Kakashi's fingers looked confused, drawing out the paper and holding it to the light. He bent one corner of it back, and Naruto half-expected the Jonin to check underneath it, to see where the _rest_ of the book had gone. Instead, the Jonin sighed and replaced the paper into the same pocket. "I suppose there's no way out of it." The silver-haired man turned to Naruto. "Did you decide on the theme of today's lesson, Naruto?"

"Hng?" Naruto mouthed around half a sandwich.

"Ah, very nice. You chose the most difficult option of any of them, but I'm sure it will have rewards of its own." Naruto couldn't enough swallow before the Jonin dug into a different pocket, taking out quite suddenly a deck of cards and a handful of dice.

Naruto made a record of swallowing usually only accomplished within the walls of Ichiraku. "Sensei! I didn't say anything, dammit!" Sakura gesticulated violently towards the jonin with the arm not occupied by a forkful of chocolate cake. Sasuke shuffled preemptively away from Naruto, deftly shuffling the mound of food stacked in front of him.

Kakashi waved his hand, eyes closed with what looked to be a look of satisfaction. "No, no. I understand! Challenging yourself is the only way to grow stronger, right? A challenge _this _large and this early can only mean good things." He paused, striking up a pose of repose. "Or, it could stress you to the point where you burn out and become institutionalized." He paused. "I'm _sure_ that won't happen."

Sakura snorted, daintily laying the fork spotlessly clean of cake beside a plate which looked to be bleached. "Sensei, you shouldn't joke around like that. Naruto believes everything so easily that it's almost unfair." The pink-haired kunoichi turned in her seat to watch Kakashi. "You ...you _are _joking about that, right?".

"The goal," Kakashi began, blissfully unaware (or uncaring) of the world around him, "is rather simple. Every time I pick a red card off of this deck", he motioned towards the neatly shuffled deck to the right of his pile of food (a pile which actually looked like it was slowly diminishing), "you have to roll an even number on the die. Every time I pick a black card, roll an odd." He closed his eye, his hand making a familiar dismissing motion. "Of course, if you fail to do so, there are ...consequences."

The three genin slowly met gazes. Sakura's eyes were getting wider as unseen possibilities passed before her eyes, Sasuke had an eyebrow cocked in what could've been interest and could've been the natural position of his face just as easily. Naruto tried to express the fact that he had _nothing_ to do with their sensei's choices as best he could with only his eyes, a complicated series of blinks, and the frantic shaking of his head so emphatic it nearly shook off his hitai-ite.

Naruto was almost positive that none of his teammates wanted to be the first to ask the question which was burning through each of their tongues. The only thing that kept him from being one hundred percent sure about it was the fact that, on occasions, Sasuke just didn't _care_. However, after one minute of a three-way staring contest passed, they heard their sensei clear his throat. A unanimous decision on part of all participants kept the contest going for another minute, and then a few more. Naruto wasn't sure about the other two, but he was hoping Kakashi would lose slowly fade away into the background if no one acknowledged him.

When Kakashi's gloved hand snaked it's way towards the remaining piece of cake on the table, however, all pretenses were instantly dropped. Sakura's hand struck so quickly Naruto had trouble following it, the tines on her fork striking just scant millimeters from Kakashi's fingers. The jonin's quick release of the plate set it spinning, an action which was anticipated and halted by the shift of Sakura's weight on her side of the bench as she contorted in her seat, dodging Kakashi's body while at the same time snaking her arm protectively around the edge of the plate.

It settled quickly in front of her, the last rattles of porcelain against wood uncomfortably loud. Her own eyes were wide as the fact that not just the attention of her team mates was centered on her, but also the attention of three tables and four members of staff nearby. Naruto saw her cheeks redden to the point of clashing horribly with her hair, her head bowing down by inches to hide her eyes.

Her fork, however, hovered over the cake, glistening just as dangerously as a freshly sharpened kunai.

This time, when Kakashi cleared his throat, all three genin glanced up. "As I was saying," he began, one eyebrow raised with something which was either curiosity or awe, "it really doesn't qualify as training if there's not an incentive." He glanced at the few neighbors they had at the two tables now spaced even further from them then before. "Truth or Dare. The shinobi with the worse roll will have to answer a question posed by the shinobi with the highest."

Sasuke scoffed. "Sensei, what do you think we are? _Children_? We are shinobi. We have no time for _games_."

Naruto pivoted, nearly knocking Sasuke's most current sandwich out of his hands. "Games? Kakashi-sensei said it himself! This is training." He hesitated momentarily. "Of course, I'm not really sure what the hell he's trying to teach us here, but well, that's never stopped us before. You just don't want to go along with this because you're chicken."

Sasuke glared. The effect was ruined by the chipmunk-like puff of his cheeks. He swallowed heavily, increasing the damage percentile by a margin, but the damage had already been done. "You'll pay for that, Uzumaki."

Oddly enough, Sasuke was completely right.

The first card picked turned out to be black, and to no one's particular surprise, all three genin failed spectacularly. In all honesty, Naruto had to admit he was almost thankful that he had the chance to find out more about Sakura. As it turned out, yes, her hair was naturally pink, and no, she wasn't lying, and yes, very sure she wasn't lying about it. She had no siblings, both civilian parents still alive, and a reasonable number of civilian aunts still sneaking through Konoha's back alleyways in the pursuit of finding someone, somewhere doing something naughty in the act. Her mother's natural hair color was pink, though it began going grey on the day Sakura announced her intentions to become a kunoichi, and it was presently entirely grey and white. The next five failed rolls (oddly enough, in a row), all came to the fact that, no she wasn't lying, yes, she was rather sure about it, and she _would_ throttle Naruto if he asked again.

As it turned out, neither Sasuke's favorite food or drink involved the bittersweet flavoring of his own tears. He was partial to seafood, but didn't enjoy sweet food very much, and Naruto's hand itched for a pen to jot down lobster-shaped cake blueprints and outlines for amazing plans involving muffins. Kakashi's constant vigilance kept all the genin on edge, and it appeared that with the jonin's perverted stories being taken away, he was reduced to paying attention to his own genin for entertainment. His evil eye caught every fledgling attempt to lie (which, even Naruto could admit to himself, wasn't hard when it was limited to Sasuke's glares and grunts, Sakura's attempts at making a poker face worse than each one prior to it, and his own fragile attempts at keeping Sakura from finding out about the Noodle Incident. It didn't work.)

All in all, Naruto was sure he got the wrong end of the deal. Kakashi picked a streak of red cards and Naruto rolled exactly one for every one of those cards. Sasuke discovered that yes, Naruto was the one who put electrical tape over the leather binding on the Uchiha's kunai on the first day of weapon training. The blonde was also responsible for Sasuke's initial exploration into the world of snakes-in-a-polish-can, "grease on binoculars" during one of their first D-missions, and a small series of coincidental "accidents" when both boys were nine which left Sasuke, in the end, the target of wrath from an entire group of 14 year old male genin, a pair of irritated chuunin girls, and a very angry cat.

In retrospect, Naruto wondered if he was the one who began the Uchiha's seemingly endless dislike for animals. The hamster fiasco in their third year of academy probably had something to do with it, the disastrous introduction to messenger hawks a few weeks later hadn't helped, and though he really didn't have _anything_ to do with the locust-like spread of kittens in Konoha last April, he had the feeling that he was at least partially responsible for most of the early D-missions they'd gone through involving the Fire Lord's cat, having been the one to introduce it to the seedy feline underworld in Konoha in the first place. Then, of course, there was the horse. If it hadn't have been for that horse, the entire last year of Naruto's education might've gone entirely differently.

The fact that Naruto gradually began improving his rolls was only a mild conciliatory gesture compared to the fact that he still ended up spilling more than he'd like to about that particular train of thought to his teammates. There was something, however, to be said about the fact that despite the punishment was truth and dare, no one dared ask anything but truth.

Their waiter set their drinks before them, interrupting Naruto from a long chain of humiliating losses which, when combined with the humiliating stories they inevitably brought with them, slowly was prodding today as one of the most awkward in his life. Sakura's face still burned intermediately with the shame of revealing her father's pet-name for her - Cherry Blossom Baby - and the shame of having to hear Naruto's explanation of the scarring events which occurred in the boy's section of their swimming class. Kakashi took the initiative and passed the waiter a small gratuity, an action which made a small part of Naruto's mind ache for a moment at the sheer unlikeliness of the action. He closed his eyes for a moment, leaning over the remains of his food and the horrible die which continually spited him. "Kakashi-sensei, what's the deal here? I mean, we're supposed to be training, right? What the hell will rolling die and picking cards teach us about stealth, information gathering, and that sort of crap? Hell, just running laps around Konoha again would be awesome compared to this."

Sakura straightened in her seat so quickly that the kyuubi-vessel wondered if Kakashi had slipped ice down her back (thus eliminating it from his list of possible things to do to Sasuke, as it was unsportsmanlike to do the same prank twice). Her eyes jotted from the cards, to the die, and then to the jonin sitting next to her, intently stiring his drink. The kunoichi sat back in her seat, her hands flat on the surface of the table for a second.

She smiled. It wasn't a particularly nice smile, more along the lines of her expressions after a particularly hasty comment and even hastier retreat. It was a smile which, for Naruto, normally ended badly.

The next card picked was, oddly enough, only good for Sakura. The second card was only good for Sakura. The third roll was the start of a trend which continued until Naruto knocked his glass of water over onto Sasuke's lap. As Naruto waved for a waiter and dabbed at the newly formed lake with his sweatshirt, the Uchiha's eyes glinted dangerously red for a split second before they reverted back to black, though they were as wide as if Naruto had accidentally spilled acid on the Uchiha's shorts instead.

As Naruto continued losing for nearly an hour, it was all he could do to try to figure out why, as every agonizing secret passed, Sasuke's eyes continued to flash red, glancing at the card deck. Sakura kept pointing out the entering ninja, who weren't ever as interesting as her tone made them out to be. Apparently, he missed several ninja battles just outside the window by mere seconds, a few ANBU passing by, and a migrating flock of weasels rushing through the street.

Naruto rubbed one hand over his eyes. "I should've known something was up when you offered to train us, sensei. Is this some sort of punishment for showing you up at SAP? If it is, you can seriously go back there and show me up any time at all."

Sakura and Sasuke glanced at each other. Kakashi seemed to grin behind his mask. Naruto, as a consequence, felt a chill run down his back. He gripped at the die, feel the edges of it with the pads of his sweatshirt as Kakashi's fingers lingered over his next card.

Kakashi, Naruto realized swiftly, was stacking the deck. He was shuffling the deck with the intensity and accuracy of a card shark, and all the ease of a grandmother at bridge night. Inside of Naruto's sleeve, his die seemed to glow red hot with Naruto's own indignation. It was completely unfair, thought Naruto, that Kakashi was cheating when he should've been teaching them about stealth and guile and decept...ion... He trailed off within his own thoughts.

He wondered, briefly, if this put him above or below Sakura in terms of environmental awareness.

He watched Kakashi pick the next card. Sakura smirked behind the poor shield of her hands while Sasuke's Sharingan memorized the small nicks and dents on the back of the card's surface. A black jack was laid, the smirk on the face card cruel and malevolent.

Maybe, a spark of inspiration began, digging it's way into the crevices of Naruto's brain, he could use the die.

Before he knew it, his fingertips brushed the edge of the die, tracing passageways across it's surface for reasons even he didn't understand. In battle, he didn't particularly think about dodging out of a shuriken's path. His body reacted, and as he had all his limbs and few scars to tell for it, he thought it generally worked out well enough to keep doing it. Chakra brushed out his digits, and he realized where the tracks of his own thoughts had already passed.

Attaching chakra to inanimate objects started simply and grew exponentially more difficult as the object increased in size. There were other considerations which floated half heartedly in Naruto's mind. Intention came into play, time could make things harder or easier, and practice, of course, was a main component. The only real practice Naruto had with putting chakra into objects was with his clones and with his weapons. Pooling chakra and then pulling it back, however, was something Naruto felt on easier ground with.

Mindful of the intent eye of Kakashi, Naruto hurried chakra to the tips of his fingertips. He remembered SAP with a hurricane of scenes and words. His clones were called such because they were copies of his mental state, physical state, and experience at the time of creation. As such, each and every clone had Naruto's same attention problems. While the named clones dealt with it in their own unique ways (Foreman's attention was naturally split between all his subordinates, Cheery's attention was never actually focused on anything in the first place, and Glasses chose to completely ignore the outside world and focus on books), the rest of the bunshin did a task as best as they could before they got completely bored with it and either finished it and moved on, or complained and got poofed. Through the torrent of images, Naruto remembered the map.

The image of the map itself made the silver ring on Naruto's finger twinge, but what he decided to focus on after a brief moment of inner struggle was how he actually retrieved the map in the first place. There had, of course, been an element of luck involved, but if he pushed his chakra out like _this _and then flexed his fingers like so...

His arm _ached._ It felt very much like having fishing wire extending out of his arm from hidden caverns in his limb, where muscles Naruto hadn't even used before began unravelling. He glanced up to Kakashi's curious gaze. "Hey, wanna bet something?"

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "Why, gambling with one of my impressionable students? I wouldn't be setting a good role model if I allowed something like that." He glanced at Sakura beside him, and then Sasuke. He leaned his head to one side. "Motivational tactics, however, are good practice. Shoot." He said.

Naruto covered his aching hand with his free one, forcing himself not to tremble. "I bet you I can roll a perfect one, right now." He glanced to Sasuke. "If I win, you have to run ten laps around Konoha."

Kakashi glanced at Naruto's hand, then at Naruto's face, and then at the grey landscape through the window. He paused a moment. "Interesting as it might be that you're actually the one to propose the first dare," he began thoughtfully, "it's not worth it." He patted his pocket with what Naruto recognized as a deliberate action, rather than the usual instinct which guided Kakashi's hand. "There's no real risk involved." He added.

Naruto paused. "If I win five times in a row," he stated firmly, "you'll have to run around Konoha fifty times. If I lose even once," he promised, pausing a moment to search for something to actually promise to do, "I'll do whatever dare Sasuke can think up. The cruelest, meanest, most malevolent thing that can come out of his demented mind."

Kakashi grinned behind his mask. "Tempting, but no."

Naruto felt Sakura's gaze locked on him, and he turned to find the kunoichi's gaze riveted on him. She in turn looked briefly to Sasuke, whose red eyes were slightly widened. The dark haired boy glanced at Sakura, and nodded.

"Sensei," she began, "we think Naruto can do this. If he can't," she said, liking the taste of every word less and less as it passed her lips, "we'll all take a punishment."

"Sold!" Kakashi stated firmly. "But you use Sakura's die."

Naruto froze. The chakra on the die drew back in an instant, filling his arm with pins and needles. He glanced at Sakura, mouth open and tongue against his teeth ready to start a protest. Sakura's expression promised pain without compromise and misery without end if he didn't hold up his part of the bargain.

Kakashi easily reached over and picked up Sakura's die. It fell into Naruto's outstretched hands, weighing no less than five pounds. "Why Naruto," Kakashi began, "there's no reason to look at it like that, you know. It's not as if your teammates won't conspire to do something evil to you if you fail." He paused. "Nothing stopping Sakura from assisting Sasuke in creating a "training exercise" or "combat course" for you in the name of solidarity, now that I think about it."

The lines unfurled down his arm faster, attaching to the die with lightning speed. As the die skidded across the table, Naruto vaguely realized he didn't know how to control the die past the initial yank.

The die clattered on the table, colliding with Naruto's drink cup.

It rested on one.

Sakura sighed heavily. "Thank god." Her eyes caught Naruto's. He knew he didn't imagine the unspoken questions lurking in her eyes. Most likely among them were "How did you do that?", "Why in hell did you bet with him?", and "Do you know what I'll do to you if this goes wrong?".

"One down, four to go." Kakashi stated simply. He placed a card on the table. The Queen of hearts watched Naruto impassively. "Even."

Naruto withdrew his chakra from Sakura's die, making it tremble slightly while in the same moment casting Sasuke's out in the opposite direction. It clattered on the table, balancing perilously close to falling on a three before Naruto pulled his chakra back. The small gust of displaced air brushed it back, spinning it until it landed on a six.

Kakashi pulled another die from his vest. "Again." The King of Spades glared at him.

Naruto rolled with his other hand this time, his right hand darting behind his side of his table, where it flexed desperately to get feeling back in the tips of his fingers. He wasn't as experienced using chakra with this hand, but the concept of failure was not just unappealing, but legitimately dangerous for his health and safety.

The cube clattered to the center of the table, rattling against the edge of Sakura's plate. The single dot in the center of the die stared at the shinobi.

Kakashi fished in his vest for a moment. He unwrapped a small roll of velvet. From the inside, he drew a few coins glistening in copper, silver, and gold, a thimble, a small length of wire, and a pair of die. "Chakra resistant," he said casually, laying them in front of Naruto. "Casinos and gambling dens eventually felt the pressing need to level the playing field for their shinobi customers."

For an exercise involving deception and stealth, what basically amounted to cheating with nicer terminology, Kakashi was suddenly being very serious about an even playing field. It went without mention that it was far too serious for Naruto's liking.

Kakashi drew another card. This time, "How to play poker" brought raised eyebrows (and a disdainful turn of head and mild scoffing noise) to the table. The next pull was one Joker, the one after that was a well-dented "How to play Bridge" lesson, and two final two consisted of two more Jokers from what had to be completely different sets. Kakashi coughed.

"Roll both die for this," he commanded, smoothly placing the Ace of Diamonds down.

The die heated like coals at the merest whisper of chakra, and the kyuubi-vessel had to bite his tongue to keep from yelling. He looked at them from all angles, twisting them in the light and using Sasuke's water glass to magnify the faint details of faded seals against their surface in grey ink.

He suddenly realized that it was a very bad idea to challenge Kakashi-sensei in anything, especially when you thought you had the advantage. He really should've gotten the hint when Kakashi agreed to the terms of the bet. Never, in all their months of experience with the jonin, did the genin actually see the man running. He had the amazing ability of being able to appear directly in back of them whenever they took a brief rest to keep from collapsing in a heap, but none of the genin had actually caught him running either way.

He sighed. Sakura was going to beat him senseless, kill him, and then humiliate him so badly he wouldn't be able to go in the daylight for the next decade. If he was lucky, it would be in that order.

The dice spun in place on the table. One landed quickly, landing firmly on six. The last one seemed to spend several minutes idly spinning on edge. It took Naruto an instant to realize that was exactly what was going on.

Naruto caught his teacher's eye. "What the hell is going on?"

Kakashi scratched the side of his mask. "Just hit the table. It happens from time to time."

With a deep breath, Naruto slammed an open palm onto the surface of the table, attracting stares from all other tables in the restaurant, and sending the remaining die careening into the ceiling. It bounced off one steel supporting beam, ricocheting easily into the kitchen. It landed somewhere with a brief splash. Even from the opposite end of the restaurant, Naruto could hear a series of thumps, crashes, mild explosions, and mildly muffled swear word chains which could curdle milk.

Kakashi glanced at Naruto. Naruto glanced at Kakashi.

"So," Sakura began awkwardly, "what does that count as, sensei?"

Kakashi seemed to turn one ear closer to the commotion in the kitchen. The other tables of shinobi turned back to their meals, typical to the ninja principle of checking a scuffle out in case it could be dangerous to you, and the Konoha principle of keeping your nose out of problems which weren't yours.

"Hm." Kakashi wondered. He turned one eye to Sakura. "How did you "manipulate probability" and "adjust unfavorable circumstances to your favor"?"

Sakura seemed to be trying to burrow through her shoulders with her chin. "After I realized what the exercise was about, sensei, I realized that you were using a specific pattern. It was just a matter of figuring out which card was coming up and then using this," she paused, holding up a disk the size of an after-dinner mint, "to control the cores inside of them." She tucked the magnet back into one of her pouches. "You wouldn't give an exercise about deception and stealth without giving us ways to figure out ways to manipulate it, sensei. Magnetic dice were a nice touch." She glanced at the chakra-resistant cube sitting in front of Naruto with one eye.

"Ah." Kakashi stated simply. Sakura melted back into her seat, slowly colliding with the sticky vinyl of the bench as she tried to avoid his glance. It wasn't the absent observation Kakashi usually took of their comments, but the intent notice of a shinobi, trained to observe and remember. He turned to Sasuke, who glared under the scrutiny. "Sharingan?" He ventured.

Sasuke inclined his head. "Hn."

"And you, Naruto-kun?" Kakashi asked sweetly, honorific sliding past his lips like molten honey (to general horror and nausea).

There was a moment's pause. "Are you going to do something like this again? If you are, I don't want to tell you. I mean, I could use this again."

Kakashi closed one eye in a pleased curve. "Very good! You never know when you'll need an advantage or two."

Naruto felt a rise of satisfaction course through him at his sensei's praise. If he would've gotten praise like that from his teachers at the academy, Naruto knew he'd already be Hokage and would've graduated at five out of the need to please. "So, I won, right?"

Kakashi extended one finger. It did not bode well. "Actually, Naruto-kun," he began, his tone serious, "you failed."

There was a short pause.

"WHAT?"

A fourth of the restaurant had already seen the wisdom in ignoring the strange table near the window, but the remainder of the shinobi shot Team 7 a range of nasty looks stretching from the "Annoyance" end of the scale all the way to "Intent to Maim". Sakura sheepishly removed her outstretched hands from where they'd collided with the table, sliding into her seat meekly.

There were hand-print-shaped dents on the table, spider-web cracks marring that entire side. Kakashi watched them spread with interest. "I am not an unkind man," Kakashi lied. "Naruto lost because technically, he was supposed to win with the dice I gave him. Now, I did tell him to stop the die rolling, which led to the disqualification of that roll..." He trailed off. "Hm."

Naruto resisted the urge to kick his teacher in the shin. He wasn't stupid, after all. Instead, he gave his jonin-sensei his best glare, lifted his chin as far as his neck would allow, and exposed his teeth until his lips hurt. "You just don't want to run! I knew it! How the hell are we supposed to have a bet if you didn't intend to go through your part of the bargain in the first place?" He demanded

The temperature around Kakashi was icy. Sakura looked vainly for an escape route, glancing at the window to judge just how many inches of safety glass lied between her and actual safety. "I don't go back on my word." He said with narrowed eyes. There was a moment of pause, and Naruto took that time to close his jaw, count to fifty, and concentrate on breathing slowly and evenly.

"I'll run." Kakashi said with a smirk which nearly showed over the edge of his mask. "After all, you did do so very well." This was not the sort of praise which actually meant things went well. Quite the opposite, usually.

Sasuke turned to Naruto. "You actually got him to go through with it?". He sounded vaguely impressed.

"Of course, I never said I'd be running alone." Kakashi added.

Sasuke's glare was, for once, lost in the great sea of Sakura's fury like a half-lit buoy on a stormy night.

"Na-ru-to..." Sakura growled, anger and killing intent boiling around her in great lines of smoke. Naruto had never heard inhalation sound quite so ominous.

"Well, best get to it!" Kakashi said cheerfully, pushing away from the table and then appearing next to it in a smooth motion. "Have fun."

Sasuke was the first to find his tongue. "You...You aren't coming." It wasn't a question, more of a sudden realization of an unspoken fact.

"Oh, I'll watch, just in case you get into trouble." He waved one hand widely. "I never said I'd run with you, you know." He added conversationally. "You really should iron out the details before you propose bets. It's just stupid to leave escape routes like that."

Naruto twitched.

* * *

Something awful was about to happen. Of course, something awful had already happened, but it seemed as if something _worse _was still waiting in the wings for the most inopportune moment to introduce itself. It never ceased to surprise Naruto how Konoha could stretch and contort itself depending on what needed to be done around it. If you needed to find a specific street, it twisted on itself so that the street seemed two feet wide and you jumped over it like a gutter. If you needed to run around it, on the other hand, it expanded three times the size it actually was in a sort of primal revenge against shinobi for decades of collateral damage. By the end of all ten laps, Naruto was steamed in his own sweat, covered in mud up to his ankles which even his sweatshirt couldn't repel, and aching in all four limbs and most of his organs.

On top of that, the bitter taste of events to come _still _hung in the wind. It took until Naruto reached his front door that he could identify where it stemmed, and he blamed that on the fact that the last time he'd felt quite this exhausted was on their C-mission-turned-disaster.

Alarms blazed within Naruto. His shinobi danger sense didn't even twitch, and while years of pranking Iruka had left Naruto with a sort of radar for the chuunin, the kyuubi-vessel didn't feel a trace of his old teacher. No shinobi symbols on the front of Naruto's door said "Safety goggles required past this point" or "Will explode under pressure". The booby traps Naruto had set up once when he was eight and never replaced were still in a state of ill repair. Any shinobi worth his salt would've replaced the toothpick out of muscle memory, long engrained over the years. In short, there was no reason he could put a finger on that explained the dread that leaped from the doorknob to his fingertips like static.

Even through the haze of confusion and mild tension which made the hairs on his arms stand up, Makoto was still a welcome sight. While she did look stressed to a point, no one seemed to be attacking her, and she did smile when he came in. There _was_ something strange about the way she sat at the far end of the table, two cups of tea and a brewing pot arranged in front of her, framing a plate of delectable looking cookies.

Years later, he'd still blame the cookies, though some of the blame had to go with his Snare and Traps teacher, who _obviously_ didn't teach him nearly enough about bait.

His hands found a sugar cake the size of a softball at about the same time he slid into the chair nearest to Makoto. He absently glanced at the windows, finding no hidden traps he could detect. The few kunai marks and explosive residue rings from the night prior had disappeared, either from a healthy scrub or a new window entirely.

His eyes inevitably drew themselves back to Makoto. A minute went by, and he had just moistened his mouth to say _something_ when Makoto blushed and pulled from the chair on the other side of her a stack of what looked like brochures, titles hidden by her long fingers.

"You told me before about the gaps in your education, Naruto-kun. I saw for myself how they neglected your cleaning and cooking, and goodness knows what would've happened if that laundry was left to mold for another few days." She shook her head, a flash of anger replaced by the same blend of embarrassment and awkwardness which dominated her face instants before. "I never thought a village which boasts so many wonderful advances would keep one of their own so behind, though." She breathed in deeply. "The only excuse a boy your age has for not know about pregnancy is the deliberate ill-will of those around him. As your grandmother, as someone who knows their duty to the younger generations, it has fallen to me to teach you about...about..."

Naruto stood very, very still. A section of him hoped vainly that she would forget about him if he didn't even breathe. Another section of him scanned desperately through dozens of the stealth and cameflogue classes he actually attended for that one special jutsu which would let him take on the exact coloring of the chair and walls.

Makoto mutely shuffled the stack of pamphets to Naruto. The first one had a small portrait of a smiling boy and a blushing girl in pigtails. The second one had a picture of a cartoon rabbit with the title of "Hare Down There". The third was yellow and cracked in the manner of all old parchment. By the looks of it, it had never been opened. The title alone - "Slots and Tabs - A Friendly Guide to Boys and Girls" - was more of a deterant than a thousand poisoned shuriken with a tracking jutsu.

His mouth dropped in silent horror.

Makoto concentrated her gaze on her hands, which were busy wringing the life out of a napkin. Were it not made of cloth - and Naruto tried to picture where he'd _ever_ seen a handkerchief with embroidered lilacs in his house before - it would've turned into a thousand tiny motes of dust. As it was, Makoto was doing her damnedest despite the odds.

She inhaled. Naruto was halfway through the seals for Kawamiri no Jutsu in the vain hopes that maybe _this_ time it would work when he realized he still had half a cookie crumbling in his fingers.

It was a credit to Makoto's determination that she did not falter or budge. "Naruto, when boys and girls reach a certain age, their bodies start to do amazing things."

A silence had _never_ been so welcomed as that which fell between each of Makoto's carefully worded sentences. Naruto's eyes didn't dare look to his grandmother's. He didn't dare look past the tips of his fingers, beyond which lay information he'd never known or, after learning it, ever wanted to.

Thankfully, however, Makoto seemed to concentrate on analogies and euphemisms. It took Naruto a few minutes at first to realize that cabbages and tabs didn't factor into it as much as Makoto's repetitions emphasized, instead describing a physical act Naruto desperately, achingly did not want to learn. A part of Naruto was incredibly glad that _he _hadn't inherited Makoto's ability of knitting one sentence to the other to make an oddly shaped conversation which at times resembled a lecture, at times an anecdote, and at times a mobius strip.

There was a soft shuffle of feet through the hallway. It pricked his senses, and even Makoto readied another long silence as his head whipped towards the sound of cloth against fingernails beyond the door. Keys jingled, metal collided and his savior arrived, clad in black and yellow and bringing with her the lost taste of _hope._

Haruka, one foot in the door, glanced first at her mother, frozen in the midst of forming very complicated hand puppets, and then to Naruto, hands trembling around the stack of faded and worn pamphlets. Her eyes widened. "Oh mother, no."

Makoto sighed. "Haruka, I know what this looks like." The elder woman glanced at her own hands, quickly laying them down on her own lap. "It's precisely what you think, actually. But, you should know that I've thought about this very hard, and though it's proven to be," she hesitated, drawing in another deep breath, "_difficult_, it's something that needs to be done. It's for Naruto's own good, you know." Despite the fact that he was sure Makoto really did have his best interests in mind, he _really_ had to help her define her definitions of what "good" was.

"By me." Haruka stated, crossing her arms. Both thankful and desperate for something to glance at aside from the smiling rabbit mascot on the cover of one of the pamphets, Naruto glanced at his aunt. Haruka was wearing a black apron over a eye-gougingly yellow shirt, with yellow and black striped socks. There was a small bumblebee on the corner of the apron, a multitude of pockets nearly hidden stuffed with straws, nearly-hidden bundles of silverware, and what by scent had to be an entire spice rack.

"As the elder family member," Makoto began doggedly, "it should be my responsibility to... to..." she glanced at Naruto, echoing his horrified, petrified gaze before shifting back to her daughter. There was a pause. "Would you?"

Naruto had never come to his feet as quickly. Massive amounts of pain caused by kunai was _far_ less of a motivation than massive amounts of humiliation caused by family.

As the younger woman led him through the halls of his own apartment building with only a few wrong turns, his aunt wrapped one arm around his shoulders. "Think of it this way, Naruto. You're the latest in one of the most time-honored traditions of the family."

"Murgle." Naruto replied.

The blond woman nodded absently. "Long ago, my father rescued Arashi from the well-meaning but ultimately scarring attempts of my mother. Years later, your father granted me the same reprieve. In a way, it's an honor." She glanced at Naruto. "On the other hand, this is just as embarrassing for me as it is for you."

"Hrng." Visions of rabbits and hair mixed together in Naruto's head, blending slowly with snippets from past years, the magazines in the Hokage's desk and, most horrifyingly, his own successes with the Sexy no Jutsu.

The Sexy no Jutsu which almost precisely remembed his _grandmother_ in her younger days.

The idea that he'd flashed his grandmother's naked body to the majority of male role models in his life and the newfound information about why that was a _horrible_ thing suddenly suddenly made him feel he was about to throw up the last three years worth of ramen.

Haruka gently pulled the pamphlets from the shinobi's fist, finally steering him towards the first few steps of the stoop. "You're taking it better than I did, really." She held the documents at arm's length, no more than three fingers on the paper at any time. "_How_ did she get these out of the fire?"

"Fire?" Naruto contributed, slowly getting used to the feeling of a tongue in the _front _of his mouth, instead of halfway towards the back of it.

Haruka nodded, mostly to herself. "We didn't spend the decade and odd entirely on the road, you know. Even I don't have that much wanderlust in my bones. No, there were towns, small communities where we'd find ourselves stuck for a few years. We tried not to get too attached, mind you." She hesitated. "Probably a good thing, in retrospect. Anyway, many of our precious albums and paintings and mementos were lost. The fires, the floods, the hurricanes." She sighed. "And yet _these_ survived."

Haruka set the pile down on the step next to her, nudging the pile with her elbow until it was almost hidden in the corner against the wall. She rubbed her eyes, ran her hand over her mouth, and then turned to the Kyuubi-vessel. "So, how traumatized are you?"

"Completely." Naruto groaned. "It's just ...with the hair, and th-the slots, and ... why did she have to involve rabbits? I _see_ a Rabbit . I'm never going to be able to think about her or any other living thing the same way again." The shinobi curled his legs so far up that, combined with the droop of his neck, not a blond hair could be seen. "Haruka, tell me _why I needed to know this?"_

Haruka snorted. "Naruto, my mother told me what you told her this afternoon." A second's worth of thought brought back to mind the kyuubi-vessel's conversation with his grandmother. About hookers, and pregnancy.

"Oh sweet spirits in holy heaven."

"I know you probably won't feel comfort in the fact that you brought this upon yourself. It does, on the other hand, make me feel better." Haruka held her hands in front of her as Naruto whipped his head up to viciously glare at his aunt. She laughed. "Alright, alright. Joking, geez." A sort of tension had dispelled suddenly, and in the short silence, Naruto pulled his head from his thighs, briefly marveling at his own flexibility. For a moment, it was peaceful. "So." his relative began, rubbing her hands together in a warm up gesture Naruto really should've anticipated, "Sex."

Naruto immediately buried his head so far into his legs that he thought he hit bone. He continued on doggedly, using his folded arms as shields against his ears. Even the _fox_ didn't want to hear another word.

He felt something poke his leg once, twice, and on a continuing pattern which might've been the tune to "Tiptoe through the tulips" before he finally, wearily glanced up.

Haruka raised one eyebrow. "Sex," she started, somehow managing to overlook Naruto's massive cringe, "...isn't something I want to talk to you about."

Naruto felt the faint stirrings of hope deep in the cockles of his heart.

"I mean, it's been what, three days since we met each other? Blood though we might be and as fond of you as I am already, Naruto, I _don't_ want to talk to you about this. It's far too embarrassing for this sort of thing already." Blue eyes glanced through Naruto and into the wall, scanning him with all the ease of his academy teachers. "Ask _me _when you're ready, Naruto."

Flocks of white birds swooped down from heaven, bringing strings of stars across the sky and automatically pushing the moon through three phases, where it was suddenly so bright it perfectly illuminated the angelic choir down the street, next to the Deli. Naruto breathed in deeply. "_Thank you."_ He whispered.

Haruka laughed, and he was astounded once more that it didn't sound like bells ringing or the churn of a waterfall. His aunt had a deep laugh, and he realized that she tended to snort when she found something particularly funny, rather like Chouji in the academy and Sakura when she was having a particularly rough day. "Let me tell you one thing Naruto. I'll try to make this as painless for both of us as possible." She inhaled deeply, reading something on the inside of her eyelids. Naruto fidgeted but stayed put, counting down the seconds until he could bolt without remorse. "Ninja are just like mercenaries in the fact that some attacks are more difficult than others, right?" She waited for Naruto's nod before continuing. "I'm trying to translate what my father told Arashi, and what he told me so that it would be easier for both of us."

Naruto recovered enough to raise an eyebrow. "Which lecture is this, exactly?".

"Nothing scary." Haruka stated. She put her hands in front of her placatingly. "It's not going to be embarrassing, I swear!". Naruto didn't bolt because somehow, her admittance didn't fill him with nearly the amount of dread Makoto's had. With a rolling gesture of his hand and a weary smile, Naruto bade his aunt to begin.

"Alright. When you're facing an opponent, you first study him to find out his weaknesses, right? You discover facts about him like his family, his hobbies, his favorite techniques, or his favorite hot springs slowly, after intensive research and reconniscence. When you finally meet him face to face, would you attack first, Naruto?"

Naruto scratched one of his whisker marks in thought. "Well, usually I just charge into battle head first. I mean, surprise attacks really are an advantage for ninja." Haruka winced, which Naruto took as a subtle hint he was going the entirely wrong way with the analogy, and it was due to explode any second. "But, yeah. I mean, if I did all that research on him, it really could only mean that he's a strong opponent. I'd probably prepare the meeting site with tons of booby traps and wires first, but I'd let him go ahead ." Haruka looked triumphant.

"Now," she said with a smile working on her lips, "imagine that that really strong enemy is a girl you like." She paused. "You can probably do without a large deal of explosives for that first meeting." Naruto raised an eyebrow. "Or," she continued, "that could be a particularly strange shinobi courtship ritual I thankfully am not aware of." She gesticulated towards the street, and the kyuubi-vessel could tell she wasn't just pointing out the row of houses across the way, or even the merchant shops on the reverse of those. "Dating," she said to Naruto's quickly falling excitement and rapidly increasing horror, "is just like doing battle with a really, really dangerous foe. You have to be careful about where you step, what you say and how you say it, and most importantly, how you attack."

"Haruka, I don't understand why you're telling me this. I mean, sure, Sakura-chan would be a really painful opponent. It would suck to be against her, but why would I do so much boring research before asking her out on a date? All I need to do is beat the crap out of Sasuke and she'll know how awesome I am." He felt very cold, very suddenly. Haruka raised one eyebrow at him. "Right?"

There was a mild rank "E" silence which slowly skyrocketed through the ranks, bypassing "D" and "C" entirely to land somewhere within "B" and "A", the same sort of silence which normally came after blackmail pictures were brought out in a school assembly or an oven-engulfing blaze was spotted by the house's owner, halfway through putting it out.

"Oh." Naruto said. Haruka leaned back on her hands. "You're sure about that? I mean, really, really, really, _re_-" The woman nodded, the angle of her head not quite managing to hide her smile. Naruto inhaled as two cogs within his mind slowly clinked against each other. Parts of his mind which he hadn't used in years groaned their way into activity. "How the hell does Sasuke do it, then?"

"Hm?" His aunt turned her body towards him, one leg crossing over the other at the ankle. Somehow, she made it look awkward. She was rounded where she should've been pointed, and pointed where she really should've had something there. "Your teammate from last night? What exactly does he do?"

"He attracts fangirls like a rotting carcass attracts flies!" He paused. "You know, I was going to pick another analogy, but right now, I really like that one. See, he can just stand there and girls will start mauling each other. He doesn't care about their hobbies, or their families, or anything of those sorts of things. He just wants to be a jerk." He paused, conceding a nod. "And something about getting stronger, but I'm pretty sure that's his second favorite hobby after sulking."

Haruka sighed. "Girls are strange, Naruto."

"Tell me about it. I probably have just as much a chance of learning to fly as I do of figuring out how girls think." For a moment, the long, twisted train of Naruto's thoughts teetered on the edge of a tall precipice. Below him led awesome but ultimately distracting thoughts of how incredibly cool it would be to _fly_ during missions. He was halfway through naming jutsus as his train was halfway over the cliff when his aunt stretched, more bones popping in her arms and shoulders than he even thought she had.

"You know that metaphor I was trying to use a few minutes ago? What I was _trying _to get to was the fact that certain techniques are overkill for certain battles. My father wouldn't use his largest sword if he was killing cougars around the village, and I have a feeling ninjas don't generally use their powers to blow themselves up at the earliest possible convenience, either. In that same manner, beating up Sasuke might be your Suicide maneuver, Naruto. Certainly, it would be effective if you'd worn the beau of your choice - Sakura, is it? - down by finding out her interests and hobbies (let's call them "weaknesses" for the sake of continuing the chain). Instead, it just does you more damage than it does her."

She paused. "Then again, the sum of my experience in ninja villages totals about a week, at best. I'm likely off about some of the descriptions, but they should've been enough. Besides, you really shouldn't need to worry about this for a few more years. Only five, or ten, or even..." she trailed off as Naruto waved one hand in defeat.

"I already asked you if you were sure about this, right? Okay, okay. Stupid question." Naruto glanced at the stars for guidance. As it turned out, the angelic choir had turned the corner nearly half an hour ago, the birds had dissipated into clouds of feathers already spread by the breeze, and the flowers seemed nothing more than a particularly descriptive figment of his imagination. "Why does _everything_ in my life revolve around research lately?"

Haruka arched an eyebrow. "There was more than - oh, what was it? BIRCH? - the other day?"

"You don't know the half of it." Naruto hopped to his feet easily and lent his hand to Haruka as her long limbs made her fumble getting up. Absently, he noted the yellow headband hidden in the ultimate camouflage of Kazama/Uzumaki hair. A bumblebee bobbed on a spring cheerfully. "Hey, it was your first day of work today, wasn't it? Wanna talk about it?"

Haruka smiled. "That would be lovely."

Naruto pursed his lips for an instant. If he had been watching himself, he would've remarked on the remarkable similarity to Glasses, likely using terminology banned within five hundred yards of a schoolyard. "What's the name of it, anyway? I mean, it has to be a restaurant. Nobody would work in a bookstore and carry around straws like that."

With a good natured, suffering turn of lips, Haruka glanced towards the sky. "Honeybee's Sugar Garden and Desserterie." She paused, and not unkindly, answered Naruto's unspoken question. "A "desserterie" is a place which sells deserts and sweet things. We have a coffee bar, and cases and cases of things which are covered in various icings."

"Wait, we have one of those?" Naruto asked, speaking for the majority of Konoha.

Haruka shrugged, her shoulders rolling awkwardly. "I believe it's new. We didn't get many customers today, which was all the better. It's not that I'm ashamed of where I work," she explained, "it's just that I'd like some time to get used to wearing clothes this revealing around people. Preferably over a number of years."

Despite the small voice inside of him which occasionally saved him embarrassment and humiliation, he glanced at his aunt. Her skirt hadn't risen above her knee over the course of the past few minutes, her apron hadn't contorted in the thick humidity of the stoop, and her sensible stockings hadn't suddenly traded in comfort for scandalous design. Naruto remembered seeing Sarutobi's _wife _in more revealing clothes. He scratched his hair, speechless.

Haruka sighed. "Yes, yes. Toppu would agree with you, Naruto. I was probably the only teenage girl in the last fifty years to wear too much clothing for her parent's comfort. They thought," she said with a shake of her hair, "that I would become an old maid."

Naruto snorted. "That's not going to happen." He said confidently. "I can't think of any old maids in Konoha. There's someone to love for everyone here." Tiny bells fought for attention in Naruto's skull. "Not," he continued hastily, "that you'd have trouble with that. I mean, if you were led into a cave with a sack over your head, someone would-"

Haruka waved one limp hand in his direction. "No more of that. Mother said the same thing with every city we went to. She always claimed that Mr. Right was waiting for me to run into him." She snorted. "Fat chance."

Naruto raised an eyebrow. "You don't believe in chance?" He ventured, noticing the way she nodded absently in reply.

"I'm not saying that there isn't the possibility that it exists." She said neutrally, "I'm willing to try anything once, even belief. The fact of the matter is that if you start relying on chance and luck, it makes you think about how amazing it was that events happened as they did. Maybe lightning didn't strike your house, or maybe it was the only house in the village which did. It makes you think about it being "meant" to happen." She sighed. "As if life was all mapped out by someone, with every movement planned and plotted ahead of time."

Naruto frowned. "But, it's nice to think like that. Even if it's not completely true, it makes people feel good to think that there's something ahead of them, right?"

Haruka shook her head. Naruto noticed a small bumblebee design on the headband, by her right ear. "I'm not saying that other people don't have the right to believe what they will. What I'm saying is that, in my opinion at least, people should just do what they do. They shouldn't worry about what's "supposed" to happen. They should "make" it happen." Haruka smiled at Naruto. "I really respect your goal of becoming Hokage. You have an unlikely dream, Naruto, but that makes it far from being impossible. Simply stating your intentions, merely turning your face towards that direction is a thousand steps more towards your goal than most people ever take."

The Kyuubi-vessel paused, stopping his thoughts for a moment. It was nice to think about there being such a thing as "Fate", except that, if you thought about it, "Fate" and "Probability" were the same thing. Hundreds and thousands of tiny circumstances and unlikely events had a small chance of happening, ranging from winning the lottery to falling into an open sewer on the way to lunch. The "odds" of either of those happening were rather slim, but Naruto knew that both had already happened to a particularly harried shinobi who'd checked into the mental health ward of the hospital a few years ago.

He closed his mouth. His brain hurt, complicated paradoxes clanging for his attention just as loudly as the fact that he'd just used "paradoxes" in his own mind. Glasses, he decided firmly, was going to spend a long time poofed, preferably with the dictionary as the tool of his demise.

Raindrops fell heavier than before, grabbing his attention and exploding several inches from the ground out of sheer fear of an impact. Haruka turned towards Naruto, and the kyuubi-vessel saw something profoundly old - something that looked even older than Makoto - stretched between Haruka's eyes and in the weary pull of her lips.

"Let's go back in, Naruto. If we're lucky, Mother will be too embarrassed to bring this up again for several days."

Naruto couldn't help himself. "I thought you didn't believe in luck." He pointed out.

Haruka glanced at him from the side of her eye. "Turn of phrase." She murmured quickly. "It didn't mean anything." Naruto got to his feet quicker than Haruka could, but his aunt shook off his extended hand, using the wall of the archway to pull herself upright instead. "So!" She said brightly, "Tell me about why you want to date Sakura in twenty or thirty years."

"Haruka!" Naruto protested, trying to ignore the sound of feminine coming not just from his aunt, but from his grandmother, who had lurked in the recesses of the doorway, listening to their conversation the entire time.

* * *

Well, I decided to finish an 8K word draft I had of this chapter a few days ago. Sadly, I didn't get it done in time for the one-year anniversary of this fic, but I put in a good effort.

In the space of time between my last update and this attempt, I lost a job, bought a house, got a job, and lost the small jumpdrive which contained a nearly finished 15K chapter I'd written last November. It was the loss of Shortie which hurt the most. I'll miss him.

As it is, I'm going to try to get into the swing of writing again. So far, it's been awkward and clumsy and particularly tiring, and I've nearly been late for work twice because of this chapter.

Despite it all, I'm rather pleased with this attempt. The unofficial title of this chapter was "Chapter Amazing", as in "Amazing that I'm actually writing again"

Criticism is welcome. It's been a while since I tried getting inside of someone's mind, and I can only hope I've got it right.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you've enjoyed this!


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